In yet another case of a credit card fraud, a man was duped of Rs. 40,000 when his card was used for buying petrol while he was out of the country. KH Kaji, who is a resident of Navjivan in Navrangpura, Gujarat realised that he had been duped when he was handed over the credit card statement for the months of April and May. The card showed purchase of Rs 40,000, whereas Kaji was not even in the country during the time.

"It was a discovery for me. When I contacted the private bank officials, they told me that it could not happen. The card must have been used. They then handed over the transaction details to me that showed around 25 visits to a petrol pump - Shiv Shakti Petroleum in Shahibaug. Somebody had actually swiped a physical card on the pump and purchased petrol worth Rs 40,000," said Kaji.

Kaji, who happens to be the president of the Consumer Protection Council, Ahmedabad, added that the subsequent investigations of the bank could not come up with any logical answers as to how this happened. However, the officials told him that it might be a case where the magnetic data strip of the card may be copied on another device and the other card may have been used for the purchase. Kaji, on his part, was very confident that he had not used the card at any unsafe place.

This doesn’t end there. Kaji says, "I personally approached the petrol pump and informed the owner about the case. He showed me the slips of the purchases made by me! The slips were even signed but not by me - somebody had forged my signature as it was very different from the original signature with the bank."

Kaji said that he had learnt a learnt the hard way as he was not aware of such kinds of data theft without the actual presence of card data. "I would just like to bring it to the notice of people that are careful while using your credit card at public places and handing over the same to shops and petrol pumps," he warned.