Had a letter purporting to come from my credit card company, about updating security.
The logo 'looked wrong' and appeared to have been done on a cheap home printer..... it looked like the ink was starting to run out.
The telephone numbers for the bank WERE correct....But as far as the link to the 'update your details site' was concerned, I can't comment....maybe it's been hijacked ?..Or is a complete fake ?
Anyway....Used a number that I've used on umpteen occasions to give the bank a call, and was told that they knew about a number of fake letters being sent at the mo'....."Throw it on the fire", I was told.
Can't quite make out what 'they' hoped to gain from this.....If I'd sent the form back in the enclosed envelope, they'd have got a few more details.....But not the whole kit and kaboodle.
Whether the boys in blue already have the return address under surveillance is anyone's guess.
Just be vigilant, chums.
Cheers - Phil
Cheers Phil. Other things to look for - if it's addressed Dear Sir, rather than Mr Lewis, or Mr Shaw etc...also if it has a stamp, sounds odd but banks and similar have bulk mail facilities..no stamps.
IanS
Good point, Ian..... :)
Though mine was addressed to me....(with 'Dear Mr Lewis' on the accompanying letter.)
I'm sure it's a throwback to the time I had my eBay a/c hacked...and some parasite got my credit card details, a few years ago.
As far as I can tell, the only place where someone could have found the specific combination of my card, eBay a/c and home addy details was an eBay seller in the Netherlands.
I assume he either sold or used my details.....or had his computer hacked. :-\
Cheers - Phil
However, there ARE genuine letters being sent out asking you to provide mobile and email contacts. Ma and I have had 3. so far. from our bank. First seemed to work online...others did not recognise the special number. Phoned Bank using number from statement and guy said that these letters are genuine. Posted forms.
I was probably lucky when phoning! Menu said possible 5-10 minute wait for call to be answered >:(...but got picked up straight away! :) I want my local Branch back!!! :(
If you have a local branch, take the letter there to check, I have 2 within reasonable walking distance.
Like HH, I'd like the 'local' branch back :(.....OK, it was 10 miles away in Cardigan....(But we often go to into Cardigan...So that's no hassle.)
Now we'd have to travel to either Haverford West or Carmarthen......20 miles, or so from either.
Cheers - Phil
My local bank branch is still open - just been refurbished in fact - slightly to my surprise. Two of the big four have closed theirs recently, and my bank seems much quieter than it used to say five years ago.
My building society - in town - is a nightmare. There are four teller positions - only two are ever used. Queues are huge. To even get to see the teller you have to navigate a phalanx of employees armed with iPads, whose entire job is to try and get you to use a machine instead of talk to a person. They were not amused when I suggested that the queues would be shorter if two of them were working on the teller desks, rather than desperately trying to stop us joining the queue . . .
The big Barclays in town looks even worse - no actual teller positions, not been in (not my bank), but it looks like you have to talk to a person on a monitor screen?
It's almost as if the banks are making the branch experience so bad that people will resort to using online banking instead, so that then they can turn around and say "no one uses our branches anymore, so we're shutting them".
Quote from: Raider4 on 06 November 2019, 10:01:34 PM
It's almost as if the banks are making the branch experience so bad that people will resort to using online banking instead, so that then they can turn around and say "no one uses our branches anymore, so we're shutting them".
I'm with you on that Martyn !
I know a lot of folk do 'do' online banking nowadays*.....the branches can't be as busy as they were.
Cheers - Phil
*I'll resist as long as possible, and use telephone banking if I need to check things....I simply don't trust computerised banking.
Long, long ago, I was a Post Office counter clerk...in the pre-computer days of Pension Books, Green Giros, Visitors Passports, etc. etc.etc.etc. I still have nightmares about queues! (PTSD??? ;D ).
A year or two back, I went into Newcastle to Offices where I once worked...Gone...including the wonderfully 'calm' Head Office Counter :) and the 'flagship' ;D Eldon Square (with, I think, 10 counter positions...and you sometimes had to 'hot seat' on a busy morning :Ph). A kind Eldon Sq enquiry desk directed me to a Post Office 'above a shop' on Nld St.
With trepidation , (it was Thursday (Pension Day) morning!), I entered.
There were, I think, 6 counter positions...3 staffed...AND TWO CUSTOMERS...one of which was me! :o
Ain't progress wonderful??? Depends on your view. All those counter clerks of yesteryear were on 'reasonable' pay, (though not enough! lol ), with full-time, 'permanent' contracts. They paid taxes, paid into good pension schemes and had, (they thought), security for the future...for loans, mortgages and 'life'. The economy wasn't 'broke'...it was boom time... so, down the Pub / 'wine Bar' 8) ...while you could, 'cos the gov't had long term plans...but computers were going to give us more leisure time... ;D
Wish I could go back to the '80's. :( I Maunder!
Quote from: Heedless Horseman on 08 November 2019, 02:26:18 AM
Long, long ago, I was a Post Office counter clerk...
SNAP !! :)....(That was before I transferred to BT....(You could in those bygone days)....and worked as a clerical officer for a year, before I went onto the engineering side.)
Yep.....Thursdays was pension day !......Tuesday was family allowance day.....(£1-50p per child ?)...and Wednesday was 'balance your till day.'
Balancing the tills was quite quick, because the 'town' (or more accurately the VERY large village) had half day closing on a Wednesday, so we used to shut all but one of the counter positions early, so everybody apart from the person on the open position could get on with balancing.....Then everybody would 'muck in' to balance the final till.
Our record was leaving the office at 5:35
We were strolling out of the door when the head Postmaster walked in.
Couldn't tell if he was impressed, or thought we were taking the Micky. ;D ;D
It was the late 70s when I worked there.
Cheers - Phil
I haven't had an account at a local/high street bank since 1994, when I fell out with NatWest, the robbing b******s. Haven't missed it one bit. Telephone/on-line banking does almost everything I need efficiently and effectively.
In my student days in the 80s I opened an account at NewWest, innocent little colonial that I was. I soon came to see my mistake.
When I started work, I was paid each week with a Giro cheque that I had to go to the post office on Saturday morning to cash.
Quote from: Orcs on 08 November 2019, 07:34:07 PM
When I started work, I was paid each week with a Giro cheque that I had to go to the post office on Saturday morning to cash.
When I started work, I was paid in salt, plus all the garum I could eat! Not that that was much. :( :( still the caligae were hardwearing.......
Quote from: mollinary on 08 November 2019, 07:46:37 PM
When I started work, I was paid in salt, plus all the garum I could eat! Not that that was much. :( :( still the caligae were hardwearing.......
Luxury! Sheer luxury!
Back when I were a lad, we had t' pay boss t' work 52 hours digging coal with our bare 'ands!
:D
But at least in those days when I posted on this forum I instantly had my number of posts increased! Still, those Caligae do good service, and, if I keep my nose clean, in another hundred years I will be a citizen, if there is anything left to be a citizen of.
Here we go --- Cue Monty Pythonesque type comments
Quote from: mollinary on 08 November 2019, 07:46:37 PM
When I started work, I was paid in salt, plus all the garum I could eat! Not that that was much. :( :( still the caligae were hardwearing.......
Just as long as you didn't wear socks with them. That would be wrong.
Quote from: John Cook on 09 November 2019, 01:41:06 AM
Just as long as you didn't wear socks with them. That would be wrong.
So wrong!
Surely that depends on the climate - snow were fallin earler in Birkenead !
Quote from: ianrs54 on 09 November 2019, 11:13:44 AM
Surely that depends on the climate - snow were fallin earler in Birkenead !
Sox is for nesh sutherners!
Roman soldiers wore socks or footwraps with their caligae, in areas with inclement weather. Britannia, for example.
Quote from: Ithoriel on 09 November 2019, 05:44:34 PM
Roman soldiers wore socks or footwraps with their caligae, in areas with inclement weather. Britannia, for example.
Please don't confuse a perfectly respectable exchange of nonsense with inconvenient facts! :D :D ;D ;D ;D
There is retired chap near us who wears a Suit with short trousers and knee length socks and sandals in war weather it does look rather odd. Particularly as the suit is Sky blue
Quote from: Orcs on 09 November 2019, 07:50:06 PM
. . . in war weather . . .
Must look out for that on the forecasts. Sounds like something to avoid . . .
For those who remember the Van Der Merwe joke (he's an Afrikaaner unencumbered by too much intelligence and very set in his ways).
Writing home from holiday in Canada:
******, it's cold here! I'm wearing two safari suits!
Quote from: Ithoriel on 09 November 2019, 05:44:34 PM
Roman soldiers wore socks or footwraps with their caligae, in areas with inclement weather. Britannia, for example.
Alfred Wainwright, who was something of expert on 'up north, had a view about "unsuitable clothing". I am sure he would take the view that sandals and socks are unsuitable in any circumstances, particularly in inclement weather.
Quote from: FierceKitty on 08 November 2019, 02:40:30 PM
In my student days in the 80s I opened an account at NewWest, innocent little colonial that I was. I soon came to see my mistake.
Errr...
NatWest, that should have been.
"I soon came to see my mistake."
No you didn't...It took you oodles of posts to spot that.
I read the original as Natwest, anyway. ;D ;D
Anyway.....I keep telling our postie that it's illegal to wear shorts and sandals, once the temperature drops below 5 degrees Centigrade.
I can't understand why he wears shorts and sandals when it's cold....But long trousers in the hot weather. :o
Cheers - Phil
Go easy on someone who's trying to negotiate favourable armistice terms with senility!
Quote from: John Cook on 10 November 2019, 02:02:54 AM
Alfred Wainwright, who was something of expert on 'up north, had a view about "unsuitable clothing". I am sure he would take the view that sandals and socks are unsuitable in any circumstances, particularly in inclement weather.
The Roman Army clearly agreed, somewhere in the 2nd century AD they adopted boots rather than caligae for cold, wet climes
Quote from: FierceKitty on 10 November 2019, 07:58:06 AM
Go easy on someone who's trying to negotiate favourable armistice terms with senility!
Senility ?
Good grief.....I've just spent three hours trying to put a
single song on my frigging iPod (
From my personal CD collection).....Because those ***** at Apple had me spend hours logging in to 'update my device'.. X_X X_X X_X..And I still haven't managed to get the particular song on the iPod.....I don't want my iPod to connect to Wifi ....Or whatever....AAaargh!!
From now on, when I want to put a song (or songs) on said device.....I'll do what I use to do....and disconnect the internet and do everything manually. It was SO much quicker and easier.
I'm in a VERY bad mood. >:( >:((At least Von and I managed to put some furniture together, this afto.)
Phil
Quote from: Techno on 10 November 2019, 04:11:26 PM
Senility ?
(At least Von and I managed to put some furniture together, this afto.)
But will it still be assembled in the morning ! :d :d
Yep !!!
And if it isn't, it'll make a good base for a bonfire. :D
(I'm still steaming with those w*****s at a certain fruit based company.) :P
Phil
Quote from: Techno on 10 November 2019, 04:11:26 PM
((At least Von and I managed to put some furniture together, this afto.)
Putting the couch next to the armchair isn't what we normally mean as "putting furniture together".
Anyway we have some photos of Von's efforts ...
(http://moversquotes.files.wordpress.com/2012/01/furniture-moving-quotes.jpg)(https://media.istockphoto.com/photos/woman-moving-furniture-in-her-home-picture-id625604100)(https://st3.depositphotos.com/3662505/17647/i/1600/depositphotos_176471800-stock-photo-the-girl-moves-the-sofa.jpg)(https://c8.alamy.com/comp/M5KHM5/smiling-young-woman-trying-to-move-large-sofa-at-home-M5KHM5.jpg)
While Phil contributes the brain power
(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-V_KORtWKT8c/U4CyVeQ34nI/AAAAAAAABbc/H--tEEfpMFM/s1600/Sleeping+old+man.JPG)
Nobby, there are 4 different women in the photos of "Von". Are you suggesting that Techno may well be a Mormon or a Muslim and have 4 wives. :d
No wonder he feels so ancient trying to keep up with 4 ladies half his age. ;D ;D ;D
Half!
A thousandth... :d
You're all OIKS !
(It was a small bookcase*....wot we put together...and it still seems to be standing. :P)
*This will take 2 people, roughly an hour to assemble....which for once was correct. Surprising it went that well considering the mood I was in. :D
Cheers - Phil
Ikea are doing beds for Lesbians, No nuts or screwing, its all Tongue and Groove. :d
Don't blame me - Sunjester sent it to me !!!!!
He's not Sunjester......He's a very naughty boy.
Cheers - Phil