Locked out.
I had heard that it would be impossible to access my bank account from our Lagos home, so imagine my delight when I successfully logged in last week! Hurrah! How lucky.
Well, I misunderstood. It is not "impossible" to log on from home ... but it is definitely not advisable. Because it will get you locked out of your account in a hurry. Having learned that this indeed was a possibility from a neighbor earlier this week, I decided not to try logging in from home again, and instead had our driver make a special trip to pick me up from home and take me into my husband's office where I could access the accounts from a Houston IP address.
But it was too late.
After three unsuccessful log-on attempts, 15 minutes on hold with the bank's customer service line and being transferred three times (one associate exclaimed, "You got error code ASV-214? I've never even heard of that one!"), I learned that my account access had indeed been cancelled, and that I would have to call the fraud research department ... AFTER it opened at 8 a.m. ET. So back home I went with a 1-800 number in hand.
At 1 p.m. WAT (Western Africa Time)/8 a.m. ET, I made the call. Or actually, I googled "calling the U.S. from Nigeria" and THEN I made the call (you have to dial 009+1 then the 10-digit phone number). Using a shaky cell phone connection, I managed to answer all of the fraud department's identification verification questions, including: How old is your sister? In which state does your mother-in-law own property? In which month and year did you buy your house? I kid you not. All of this data is apparently public record. Scary!
The next step is to wait for an e-mail, click the one-time-use link in that e-mail, enter a four-digit PIN code, and re-establish online access. But there was no e-mail. It was about this time that I realized I haven't received any e-mail through my Comcast e-mail account since June 4. (Don't worry, most of it is forwarded to my gmail account.) So I called back and using the same shaky cell phone connection, once again established my identification and changed my e-mail address. The service associate was kind enough to wait on the line to confirm that I got the e-mail.
So we are locked out of our account no more, and our bills will get paid for another month.
Amen for little victories.
Well, I misunderstood. It is not "impossible" to log on from home ... but it is definitely not advisable. Because it will get you locked out of your account in a hurry. Having learned that this indeed was a possibility from a neighbor earlier this week, I decided not to try logging in from home again, and instead had our driver make a special trip to pick me up from home and take me into my husband's office where I could access the accounts from a Houston IP address.
But it was too late.
After three unsuccessful log-on attempts, 15 minutes on hold with the bank's customer service line and being transferred three times (one associate exclaimed, "You got error code ASV-214? I've never even heard of that one!"), I learned that my account access had indeed been cancelled, and that I would have to call the fraud research department ... AFTER it opened at 8 a.m. ET. So back home I went with a 1-800 number in hand.
At 1 p.m. WAT (Western Africa Time)/8 a.m. ET, I made the call. Or actually, I googled "calling the U.S. from Nigeria" and THEN I made the call (you have to dial 009+1 then the 10-digit phone number). Using a shaky cell phone connection, I managed to answer all of the fraud department's identification verification questions, including: How old is your sister? In which state does your mother-in-law own property? In which month and year did you buy your house? I kid you not. All of this data is apparently public record. Scary!
The next step is to wait for an e-mail, click the one-time-use link in that e-mail, enter a four-digit PIN code, and re-establish online access. But there was no e-mail. It was about this time that I realized I haven't received any e-mail through my Comcast e-mail account since June 4. (Don't worry, most of it is forwarded to my gmail account.) So I called back and using the same shaky cell phone connection, once again established my identification and changed my e-mail address. The service associate was kind enough to wait on the line to confirm that I got the e-mail.
So we are locked out of our account no more, and our bills will get paid for another month.
Amen for little victories.
Which sister did you have to state the age??
ReplyDeleteYou have serious patience. I would have had a complete irrational temper tantrom, then make the call....and I am the 'first born' sister.
Kathryn. She came up as a question during both calls! I have no idea how they knew we were related.
ReplyDeleteGoodness! Amen for the 1000 little victories you will have during your journey :)
ReplyDelete