Big Fat Scam

Well it's finally happened to me, I've been scammed! I very innocently decided to order some business cards, labels etc from Vistaprint (who I've always thought of as an honerable company) and so went ahead and ordered back in October 08. The bits and pieces arrived promptly and I was very pleased with what I received.

It wasn't until a fortnight ago that I suddenly realised £9.95 has been taken from my account in both Nov and Dec by a company called VPRewards.com. No I'd never heard of them either. To cut a long story short, when I had finished paying online for by Vistaprint order there is a button that says, claim your £10 back from your order, so I like thousands of others clicked the button, only to realise that you had to fill in yet another form and the £10 was only off your next order. So I decided that I couldn't be bothered with it (as I didn't think I'd need anything from Vistaprint for a while) and navigated back to the page before. But all you needed to have done to enable this VPRewards to remove cash from your account is to click onto this other page. How appalling is that?

Anyway after phoning the bank and reporting it (apparently it's not fraud, as you gave your bank details to Vistaprint - my argument here is that OK I gave Vistaprint my details but not VPRewards) they said I had to cancel my card and order a new one, as they had the number of the card and could continue to take money as long as they wanted. It's been very annoying to say the least.

I managed to find details of who to contact at Vistaprint, I have to say the girl I spoke to sounded completely fed up - I imagine loads of people are phoning to complain. I told her I wanted my money back and the so called "arrangement" with VPRewards cancelling immediately. I have to say I wasn't holding out much hope to get my money back BUT this morning, lo and behold two lots of £9.95 have appeared back in my account - hurrah.

So it is worth phoning, e-mailing and generally having a go as you can get your cash back. How stupid do I feel for being scammed and not realising about it - totally stupid. How pleased am I at getting my cash back (considering if you go online and type in Vistaprint scam and prepare to be amazed by the amount of people who have lost loads of cash and have still not managed to get it back) very.

I shall be watching my account very carefully in the future, especially for any strange looking company names that I do not recognise. I do feel it is very remiss of Vistaprint though, they do not make it clear anywhere that by clicking onto the next page, a company who you know nothing about and by the way is based in Bermuda (alarm bells ringing yet?) are able to take your bank details and use them. I wonder just how much money is flowing into an offshore account somewhere? Worrying isn't it? I shall just be much more vigilant in future.

That's me, said my bit, and if someone who reads this doesn't fall into the same trap I shall feel I have done something worthwhile.