The call might start something like this: “I’m Mike from Visa. Did you make a purchase for a laptop in Cambridge, Mass., for $987 with your Bank of America debit card?”

“No. What happened?” The consumer is now concerned.

“I just want to let you know that somebody has stolen your card information. Feel free to call the 800 number on the back of your card.”

Mike confirms the consumer’s name, address, and telephone number. He offers to take care of the situation by canceling the card and removing all the fraudulent charges. All he needs is the three-digit security number on the back of the card in order to reactivate the account after the fake charges are removed.

That’s the key to the latest debit-card scam – the security code.

Once “Mike” has it, he can easily withdraw all the money that is in the debit-card account while his victim mistakenly believes the problem has been resolved. Increasingly aggressive, con artists are taking debit-card fraud to a whole new level. And because they’re preying on debit cards, instead of credit cards, victims are more at risk.

Debit-card rules allow issuers to hold consumers responsible for up to $500 in losses if they don’t report the problem within two business days. (Credit-card holders are limited to $50 in losses.)

Con artists have other tricks up their sleeves to get debit card numbers, personal IDs and security codes, according to Roman Shteyn at Credit-Land.com. The five most common techniques:

Keystroke-logger. This is computer spyware that records every keystroke typed on a computer and is used to steal confidential personal information and passwords.

Cellphone. A bystander distracts you while a scammer uses the camera built into his cellphone to snap digital pictures of your name, your credit card, and the expiration date. Criminals may also place tiny cameras on or near ATM machines in a bank lobby to record your data when you make a withdrawal.

Skimmers. Clever scammers work in restaurants, gas stations and other establishments. One trick is planting a card-reader in the register. Skimmers steal info like your address, telephone pin, etc.

Card-switchers. When you are at a restaurant, card switchers steal your card and give you back a fake card or expired one.

Phishers. Scammers send fake e-mails designed to persuade you to give up your bank card information.

The solution: Protect your card number and personal information. For example, read your monthly bank statements carefully for unauthorized withdrawals. When in doubt about a suspicious phone call or unknown charge, call the issuing bank immediately. For some protection against spyware, turn off your computer when it is not in use.

Use the same level of care when using the card. Whenever you are at the gas pump, use a credit card instead of a debit card. Using a debit card without a personal identification number is dangerous because a thief can use the receipt to gain access to your account and drain it before you are aware that anything is wrong.

At a restaurant when your card is handed back, make sure it’s yours before you put it into your wallet.

With more Americans switching from credit cards to debit cards to avoid racking up debt, their vulnerability rises because they’re using real cash to pay for something, according to a Credit Land analysis comparing credit card and debit card fraud protection.

It may be fast and easy to change an infiltrated debit card account number, but getting your money back … that’s another story. In contrast to dispute resolutions for credit cards, the study finds that the process for debit cards can involve a lengthy investigation and a drawn-out process for getting your money back. Click to write a comment or read comments about this post. MinnPost.com Full RSS Articles brought to you by: MinnRoast 2011 — Journalists & politicians gently skewered Add MinnPost’s voice to the 2012 presidential campaign! Take the 2011 MinnRoast Challenge.

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Small business credit card debt relief has never been in higher demand. This recession has been rough on everyone but especially on small businesses. If a recent businesses venture left you in at least $10,000 of unsecured debt then you will be eligible for the services of a debt settlement company. A top performing debt settlement company will be able to eliminate 60% of your unsecured debt on average and cases in the 70-90% range are not at all uncommon in this market. Getting this credit card debt relief will negatively affect your credit score but not nearly as bad as bankruptcy. If you are willing to accept a lower credit score to be able to eliminate over 60% of your unsecured debt then a debt settlement could be a wise financial decision.

Getting a debt settlement for small business credit card debt relief is clearly a better option than bankruptcy. Bankruptcy puts a much blacker cloud over your credit history and it usually takes 7 years to fully recover while most people recover from debt settlements in 1-2 years. Because it doesn’t carry all of the negative aspects of bankruptcy, debt settlements have become very popular amongst small businesses trying to get out of debt.

Only 1 of 3 small businesses make in past their first 2 years. This past couple years has been especially rough on the small business sector so if you feel like you are buried in a mountain of debt just know that you are not the only one. There are millions of people just like you whom are also trying to get small businesses credit card debt relief so it would be wise to capitalize on the current economic environment while the conditions are so favorable for debt settlements.

If you need small business credit card debt relief and want to hire a debt settlement company then I have an important piece of advice. Do Not go directly to a particular debt settlement company but rather first go to a debt relief network who is affiliated with several legitimate debt companies. In order to be in the debt relief network, the debt settlement companies must prove a track record of successfully negotiating and eliminating debt. They must also pass an ethical standards test. Going through a debt relief network will ensure that the debt company you are provided with is a legitimate and respected company.

The truth is that these kinds of plastic cards would be excellent for different purposes. You want to be able to buy goods for your establishment and sporadically one needs a plastic card in order to do. The charge card industry does make a lot of good money offering affinity cards to smaller and medium sized establishment owners out there. Establishment credit cards are how so many small office owners have been able to enlarge their businesses. It does not matter whether you are talking about a smaller establishment in Avon, Illinois or Huntsville, Alabama. The local office community in Huntsville, Alabama does understand how valuable and key these credit cards will be. Visa and others do offer some very beneficial small establishment cards.

Visa and the other companies know that smaller businesses are the life blood of the economy. People with the local Huntsville Chamber of Commerce do understand that smaller corporations create most of the excellent paying jobs within the city itself. If business credit cards were not so readily available, so many local office owners could not be able to hire as many people as they would like to hire. This would be a bad occurrence for the economy of the entire state of Alabama. Alabama needs smaller businesses, the question is whether the local businesses feel welcome in Alabama given its tax code.

This is a fact to be proud of for the local firm owners in the province. This is part of the reason why they feel like they deserve so much more support than what they get. The Huntsville Chamber of Commerce knows this issue as well. The business owners in Huntsville want to understand that when they vote someone into office that this person is going to look out for their interests.

SAN DIEGO–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Transaction Wireless™ is providing an ideal solution to maximize holiday profits with the wCharge Credit Card terminal. Merchants can take credit cards via a mobile device with no extra equipment.

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A third of small businesses rely on the overdrafts and credit cards provided by their business bank accounts when they are unable to secure loans, according to a new report.

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CALABASAS, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Recently, the computer security experts at McAfee published a list of the top ten riskiest places to give your social security number. Many of the places were surprising, with the top five places including hospitals, state and local governments, financial institutions, and universities. Luckily, finding great rates on mortgages, credit cards, savings accounts, and auto loans doesn’t require any sensitive information. Informa Research Services, a subsidiary of

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Elavon Merchant Services is a full service credit card processor that provides ample tools to all forms of small and large businesses including internet based processing, hosted gateways, electronic processing for checks, and PCI processing. Based in Atlanta, Georgia since 1991, they are the product of two companies (Nova Information Systems and euroConex) merging together to form Evalon. While their focus is in North America and Europe, Evalon has a customer book of 1 million business merchants all over the world. InternetSecure, which is their online gateway, works well with Authorize.net, the largest internet specialized payment processor.

The majority of new business brought in to Elavon is through 3rd party resellers. These sellers range in size from small, one person sellers to large scale, corporate resellers. One of Elavon’s largest resellers is Costco. Because of Costco’s size, they can offer businesses reasonable prices as well as after sale support. Since the majority of the business is generated by 3rd parties, it poses a unique problem for Elavon, which is handling customer complaints about the sales process. Most customers are unaware that the person or company selling them the service is not actually the same company that is providing it. Therefore, complaints from bad sales people can be found all over the internet even though Elavon had nothing to do with it.

For merchants looking to do business internationally, Elavon is a pretty good choice. They offer settlement of funds in 16 currencies as well as allow for a merchant to be paid in their home currency, even when a foreign form of payment is used.

Bank of America is going on a hiring spree, with plans to add more than 1,000 small-business bankers across the U.S. by early 2012. The Charlotte-based bank will start by beefing up its small business departments in Dallas, Los Angeles, Baltimore and Washington, D.C. this quarter, it said in a statement Thursday. The new hires won’t just be loan officers — they’ll specialize in developing relationships with mom-and-pop shops and managing products for them such as bank accounts, payroll systems, pension plans, and credit cards (and of course, loans). “Small businesses play a critical role in driving innovation and growth in our economy,” Brian Moynihan, the bank’s president and chief executive, said in a statement. The bank announced its plans during meetings with business leaders in Boston. Bank of America also said it is on track to “blow away” its goal of increasing lending to small businesses by $5 billion this year. It currently has about 4 million small-business customers, or 12 percent of the market. (It’s not the only bank courting small businesses: J.P. Morgan Chase has promised to increase its lending to small firms by $4 billion, and in June began offering discounts to companies that hire.)

The Obama administration has called multiple times for extending aid to small businesses to boost economic recovery and jump-start hiring. But lending to small businesses dipped 1.8 percent during the third quarter compared with a year ago, according to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Last month, Congress passed a bill – now signed into law – aimed at providing small businesses with easier access to credit. The aid package includes a $30 billion lending fund to be distributed by the Treasury Department to qualified small banks that promise to extend new loans to small business.

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img src=’http://www.inc.com/uploaded_files/image/100×100/feature-72-ski-bkt_5335.jpg’ align=’left’ style=’margin-right: 10px;’ alt=’ Soul Skier It took a true backcountry skier like Dan Abrams (above) to see that daredevils need specialized gear.’ FlyLow Gear

Co-Founders: Dan Abrams, 33; and Greg Steen, 32 Location: Denver Employees: Six full time; about six part time, plus three owner-operators Funding: $38,000, borrowed on credit cards 2009 Revenue: $375,000 Start-Up Year: 2004 Breakeven: Winter 2004-05 Insider Insight: Sell to yourself. Abrams was at the heart of the changing ski scene, so he understood the trendsetters to whom he would be selling. Blind Spot: At first, it was hard to get manufacturers to fill small and out-of-the-ordinary orders. He learned to sell them on his company’s future: “I’d say, ‘FlyLow is going to be the next North Face.’ ”

The first few rips didn’t bother Dan Abrams. In fact, the flaws in his backcountry skiwear could feel downright rewarding: the sound of a crotch seam tearing while taking that final step atop an 11,000-foot peak; the worn out Cordura knees that proved how hard he was lunging back down the mountain. After all, beat-up gear is a badge of honor for so-called soul skiers like Abrams, athletes who venture into the backcountry to hike up and ski down unpatrolled, ungroomed powder.

“My friends and I were living in Jackson, Wyoming, after college, and we spent so much time in the backcountry that we were literally tearing apart our pants and jackets every few weeks or months,” says the 33-year-old. “Fortunately, the manufacturers who made that stuff were good about honoring their warranties, so we could always send our gear in for repair or replacements.” But if no one was making stuff that he was totally happy with, Abrams wondered, “why not just make it myself?”

That was in 2001, the same year that Abrams ripped something else: the meniscus cartilage in his knee. The injury turned out to be a blessing. Laid up after surgery, Abrams, then in his mid-20s, made two life-changing decisions. First, he enrolled in business school at the University of Denver. Second, he decided to bolster his education by starting his own line of backcountry ski apparel, with the partnership of soul-skier pal Greg Steen.

Naming the business was easy. “A friend once told us, ‘You guys don’t ski fast; you fly low.’ ” Done. Abrams, who had been bartending by night to pay rent at his mother’s house while in grad school, sank a few grand from his tip jar into an order of FlyLow T-shirts in the winter of 2003-04. “We sold — and gave away — shirts and stickers in ski-area parking lots all over Colorado,” says Abrams. “It was an easy way to test our logo and brand and get our name circulating throughout the skiing community.”

As luck would have it, that community was entering a long-awaited growth spurt. Thanks to the advent of wide skis and alpine touring gear (bindings and boots that allow you to cross-country ski to the top of a mountain and then ski down), more skiers were hitting the backcountry. Resorts were letting skiers ski out of bounds at their own peril. Suddenly, the ski industry, which had been in decline, was on its way to the $4.5 billion mark.

In the winter of 2004-05, using several credit cards, Abrams spent $38,000 on his first real order, from New Zealand and China: 1,000 jackets and 200 pairs of pants, all stitched and layered (sometimes triple-layered) for durability. He also equipped the pants with side zippers for ventilation, so skiers could stay cool when slogging up slopes for hours at a time. “Backcountry skiers are very particular about gear,” says Abrams. “And people appreciated that we were a small company making improvements so they could enjoy the sport even more.”

FlyLow sold its entire first production run. Debt settled, Abrams pulled out his credit cards again, applied for a few others, and put in another order. The result was $180,000 in sales. Revenue climbed to $280,000 in 2007-08, $375,000 in 2008-09, and $500,000 in 2009-10. FlyLow now offers a full line of pants, jackets, and gloves that are available in 125 retail stores, and expects to break $1 million in revenue by the end of the 2010-11 season — not bad for a couple of guys who ski a combined 200 days a year. Ski – Dan Abrams – University of Denver – North Face – Backcountry skiing

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