Description

I usually book air travel online through Expedia or directly through the airline. This time I had a question for the airline so I decided to call. I bing searched (first mistake) American Airlines customer service which generated the number 800-433-7800. Upon calling a gentlemen picked up and walked me through what I thought was the purchasing of a flight. He stated that the charge would come in two separate transactions, one for the tickets and one for the fees/taxes. The first fee triggered an alert from my bank so I put him on hold and called my fraud dept. They stated that it's not uncommon for VISA to generate those alerts independently and it was probably safe as long as I knew what the charge was for. During the course of the call I received two emails, one confirming the travel details, and one generated from American with seat details. After I got off the phone I checked my CC statement and saw two separate charges. I compared that against the confirmation code that the scammer sent me and it turns out he did purchase tickets but also charged a separate 543.00 amount that was unrelated to the booking. I double checked with American who stated that they never charge two separate items for booking so it would was likely a scam. I'm working through disputing the charge now. What I learned is to not get lazy, go to the actual website and dig until you find the right phone number. I hope this report can help others avoid getting fooled by this scam.