WaMu Gave Grandma's Money to Crooks

The original fraudulent activity on my grandmother's bank account in December came to her attention when she received her monthly statement from Washington Mutual at the end of January. She immediately phoned WM to initiate a fraud claim (which was rejected.) Yet, on February 2, a different company (in name at least) drew up a second check for $299 which, too, was unquestioningly processed by WM a couple days later and the funds transfered from my grandmother's account to some sleazeball affliliated with an account with National City Bank (no, the name doesn't make any sense to me either) in Cleveland, Ohio.

The check looks in every way identical to the first except for the name of the company to which it's paid, the memo (it says is for "Internet Services and Power Saver" -- my grandma does not have a computer) and the phone number in authorization statement on it, which reads



For the record, it was not guaranteed by the payee -- in fact, it was entirely unbeknownst to her -- and if you do have questions, call her first. Because if you call that number, you will get an automated system that eventually dumps you in a full voicemail box.

I'm going to call back later and record what happens and put a link to the file here. But first, I am going to try to get photos of the two checks uploaded later today.

If you're trying to learn more about PowerTamers, Google is not much help.

Labels: CCR, ICT, ITP