The Better Business Bureau is hearing from consumers who have found very small charges on their credit card statements, typically charges of 26 cents or less, from a company identified on the credit card statement as “ADELE SERVICES 800-764-8104 NY.” Anyone calling the telephone number receives a message saying, “The number you are calling is not in service at this time.”
According to Charlie Mattingly, President of the Better Business Bureau serving Louisville, Southern Indiana and Western Kentucky, these credit card charges appear to be unauthorized and bogus. Mattingly says, “Years ago, someone told me that the perfect scam is one that takes $1 each from a million people rather than $1 million from a few people. Why? This would appear to because an apparent ‘small-time’ fraudster is less likely to be caught and prosecuted for the crime. In this case, the scammers seem to be thinking they may get by with taking an even smaller amount from an even larger number of victims.”
Some commentators on this scam have speculated that these small charges are placed to verify that the credit card number is good, and once the small charges go through, larger charges will come next. However, it is unclear whether those credit cards receiving the 20 cent or 25 cent charges from “Adele Services” will later be hit with larger charges. To date, neither calls to the Better Business Bureau nor Internet searches are turning up reports of larger charges from “Adele Services.”
Based on the volume of reports of small charges on credit cards, this apparent fraud scheme may be taking pennies from millions of people, which would aggregate into “real money.” If this scam succeeds, other “micro-charge” scammers, using different business names and different bogus toll-free phone numbers, will soon be placing similar charges. The BBB strongly encourages consumers finding even small unauthorized charges on your credit card statement to immediately report the unauthorized transaction to your credit card company and assure that the charge is removed from your account.
In addition to reporting the unauthorized charge to your credit card company, BBB encourages you to file a complaint with Better Business Bureau at www.bbb.org and with the Internet Crime Complaint Center at www.ic3.gov. If the charge on your credit card is from Adele Services, the only address that BBB research has found for the company is Adele Services, 68 South Service, Melville, NY 11747. This is most likely a bogus address rather than the physical location of the scammers. However, consumers wishing to file a complaint with the Better Business Bureau and the Internet Crime Complaint Center could use this address in submitting complaints.