nvtech

Hello Frequent flyers,

Today when I logged in to my British Airways account, I noticed an 80,000 avios drop in the balance. First I thought my points got expired.
But then when I looked in to account history, I saw an actual redemption.

Also in the latest search history, I see on April 04, someone tried to search flights between Beijing and Tokyo between April 09-13.
I did give a call to BA.com CS and they confirmed me that a booking was made on April 04 for party of 2 ...and the names given which more sounds like Chinese or Japanese..but definitely I am not aware of. BA locked out my account until further investigation. Its so weird that who ever did this made sure they use some other email address for the confirmation emails. They also seem to use a credit card with an unknown number and use my billing address to pay taxes around $147.

Do any one else have fraud associated with BA avios?..Also do any of you think Award Wallet could be a problem?
I am just concerned what else would be at stake after this problem.

thebigben

It is quite common in the underground economy.

Steal someone's account - milk it - drop it. That's also why you shouldn't buy status / avios / flights from unofficial 3rd parties.

Change your password, and check out https://haveibeenpwned.com/

Often1

Not only has your BAEC account been compromised, but your identity may have been stolen. The fact that someone obtained a credit card using your billing address suggests a much greater issue than one simple transaction.

Your profile does not show where you are located, so it is hard to advise. But, generally speaking you need to change all passwords for all accounts, institute a credit freeze, make certain that there are no unauthorized charges on any of your legitimate accounts and consider having those reissued with new numbers.

You should also confirm with BA that the tickets have been cancelled. That makes it a lot easier for you to have the avios refunded, although this will likely happen sooner or later anyway.

adrianlondon

Not necessarily. It could be that the credit card is registered in China correctly, but the tax amount wasn't high enough to trigger a check. I know I've used a UK credit card on BA while leaving my billing address as Switzerland by mistake, and it went through just fine. The amount was only about £17 though!

Ldnn1

I think you're jumping the gun there. The fact that the fraudster entered the OP's address as the card address does not mean that the card used was actually registered at that address.

simon79

Flame3601

Out of interest, has the OP been to Asia recently and logged into his BAEC account while using any "free" wifi network?

GlasgowCyclops

I had my PayPal used by someone else two weeks ago. It took money from my bank account to pay someone and the goods were sent. I have been reimbursed. However, what many people don't know is, if you get a UK debit card renewal the number is still active (or even the same). Even if the house/card address is different.

EG I never used it in 8 years before this incident and it was still active. I've had three debit cards since then from the same bank but my address is different. It didn't matter, I still had money taken from my account.

The only way to generate a different card number and break the link is to get a new card sent because of fraud or suspected fraud.


So be wary.

edealinfo12345

At the very least, you should call and cancel the ticket, fraudulently issued against your Avios (you have the right to cancel). You may not get the miles back (that is a separate issue) and will have to fight to get back the miles. But, you alone have total power to cancel the ticket. Use it!

Often1

Almost all major card issuers subscribe to a service which matches the card number to at least parts of the billing address entered. That is the purpose of asking the consumer to enter that information. The only data necessary to process a transaction is the card number. The remaining information is all data protection (and idiot-proofing).

sxc

And this is why BA is blocking CX availability online close to departure date. I assume BA could cancel the ticket and give you back your avios?

beachmouse

It's also sadly common with IHG hotels reward accounts, likely due to 4 digit pin numbers being easy to hack:

https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/inte...nts-spent.html

nvtech

The tickets seems to have been cancelled. I am glad we found out before the Fraud pax were suppose to take off. I wish they were caught.
I looked in to all my accounts and doesn't see a BA charge or the $147 taxes. Even though they used my billing address, it doesn't look like they have actually used one of our credit card.
I did place a credit freeze.

nvtech

The fraud happened when someone actually were able to login to my account. Unfortunately, I did have 4 saved credit cards with Billing addresses.
So I guess people used a new card and still made sure they use my billing address to get through BA website security.

nvtech

Since I reported the problem to BA 7 hours before the fraudsters were able to take off, I was assured the tickets would be cancelled and also my account would be locked out by security for investigation.
They assured we will get back our miles. I will keep posted on how things progress.