A former Otago Daily Times journalist who received a bill of more than $10,000 for a stolen credit card she did not want says new cards should always be collected from banks.
The card was supposed to have been delivered by courier to Patrice Gaffaney at her Auckland address after she had begun arrangements to switch from Westpac bank to Kiwibank.
She decided not to change banks, but the bank had continued with arrangements for the Kiwibank MasterCard.
She received a letter dated August 27 saying she had been approved for the MasterCard which was ready to be issued.
She took no action over it, but this month was shocked to receive a bill for $10,400, plus a $20 fee for going over the $10,000 limit.
This amount had been spent in 16 days on 51 transactions.
It appeared the card was to have been delivered by a courier, who was supposed to get Ms Gaffaney's signature, but when she was not home the card was left in her letterbox. It is believed to have been stolen from there.
The bank has written off the debt and is confident the thief will be found.
Ms Gaffaney said she was quite hysterical when she got the account and probably did not make much sense in her initial dealings with the bank over the issue.
During her discussions with the bank before the card was dispatched, there had been no agreement on a credit limit.
Her advice to anyone being issued with a card was to insist that the card be collected from the bank.
It should also be incumbent on banks to insist that people turn up with identification when cards were issued, she said.
In the case of the stolen card, the thieves had forged a signature on the card - "you could sign it as Santa Claus and away you go. I can't understand why banks would allow such a procedure".
Kiwibank head of fraud George Hiotakis told the Herald on Sunday the bank was constantly reviewing procedures, but did not want to make accessing credit cards "like Fort Knox" for customers.
Most cards were sent out "dead", meaning customers had to go to their nearest branch or ATM to activate them. But some, like the one sent to Ms Gaffaney, only needed a signature.
Sending all cards out "dead" would inconvenience some customers, he said.
