Financially Violated

The internet is a wonderful invention.   The fact that I can look at my bank account every day is worth the price of admission.   The ability to go into my bank account and peruse my transactions on a daily basis, the majority of which I can even see via real-time, has made ‘balancing’ my checkbook all but obsolete.  Life is good.  I go into my account every morning and glance over the transactions, looking for anything I don’t remember or anything out of the ordinary.  

This morning I sit down in front of my computer, Starbucks hot cocoa in hand, and pull up my bank account. Immediately I notice something out of the ordinary.  WAY out of the ordinary.  And that would be my balance.  $37.40 (can’t leave off the 40 cents now, can we?).  I feel the blood drain from my face as I think to myself, did I just buy a car and not remember it or something?  Go on a Tiffany’s shopping spree perhaps?   Maybe Starbucks charged me $3000.15 for my coco instead of $3.15.  The answer was none of the above.  As I scanned through the transactions it sticks out at me like a blinking neon sign. PayPal transaction for $xxxx..xx.   Long story short, I am on my bank’s website, PayPal’s website, on my office phone with my bank and my cell phone with PayPal working feverishly to get this resolved.  

In defense of PayPal, as soon as I logged on to their website (which I hadn’t done in months), a notice came up saying that they suspect my account had been accessed fraudulently and to call them immediately.  No kidding. So I did.  Of course they approved my fraud claim within hours of the call and will process the funds for transfer back into my bank account in about 10 days, but what about my heart failure?  My checking account was WIPED OUT.  What if I was someone less fortunate who lived paycheck to paycheck?  I would have checks bouncing left and right.

The bottom line is that with the indisputable convenience we get from the internet, comes an almost equally indisputable risk.  I am thankful for the security measures they had in place and wouldn’t want to be the person responsible for trying to stay one step ahead of the bleepin’ criminals who drained my checking account to within 4 Starbucks Hot Coco’s of its life.  But I will tell you this, the violation I felt at having my money stolen brought out some primal anger in me and if there was any chance that the culprits were in the United States and I could have gotten my hands on them, I would have totally gone enraged ferret on their asses.