Long-time lurker, but I rarely post.
I'll add more information as necessary and answer any questions I can, but here is the gist of it.
In my eyes, everything was going fine, then all of a sudden I learn that my father killed himself, he burned through his pension, savings, and tuition money set aside for my brother and sister. He had also opened up joint credit cards in my mom's name in order to perpetuate his extravagent lifestyle, leaving her responsible for over $30,000. She never even knew about those cards, and my father forged her signature, so we were able to get that taken care of.
Now on to me. When I was 18 my father told me to sign a document so I could get a credit card. I asked him if I should read it, and he said no and "explained it" to me. SO I signed it (stupid I know, but I was 18 and I thought he had my best financial interests at heart, he was a banker). This Chase Visa card I used rarely, maybe once or twice a month, and at the end of the month he would tell me how much I spent, and I would pay him cash. When I asked for statements or account access he would tell me not to worry about it. When I asked Chase if we could separate the account (what I know now is a joint liabaility account) several times in the past, they always told me I needed to visit a physical location and that we would both need to sign papers. When I asked my dad if we could do that he said it would be a waste of time and refused. I now see that this account type, discontinued in 2012 due to security concerns, is a financial abuser's dream. I had absolutely no recourse because I was jointly liable but not authorized to conduct any account-related business.
When he dies I get access to the account and see my first statement ever. $3,000 in debt. After my mom gave me the statement and his account information (after going through his files when he died), she let me know that there looked like some fraudulent Uber charges. All of our Uber accounts (including my dad's, I have his phone) were connected to different cards. Turns out there was 2 years of Uber Fraud totaling almost $9,000. So it looks like my dad thought that was my brother or sister, and decided he couldn't get money out of them since they weren't working yet.
Chase has denied my fraud claim because it's been going on for too long, but I feel they didn't really look into my claim at all. The agent I spoke with said the majority of the claims were from Miami (an adjacent city), but would not be able to provide any addresses of any trips. I do feel like they messed up in 2 big ways:
(1) They enabled a financial abuser and prevented his victim from having any recourse.
(2) They are holding me liable for a debt which they never once communicated to me. I feel that liability without communication is ridiculous.
Uber is a nightmare to get in touch with, and I realize if I'm not a large organization or have a lawyer, they will never respond to me about this.
Do I have any options? Recourse? I know it's not a ton of money, but the thought of having to pay the fraudulent debt of my financial abuser after he killed himself makes me feel sick. I'm not looking for a payout from the fraud that my dad paid off so far, I just want the slate wiped clean.
Sorry if I missed anything, there's a lot going on.
Edit: Police Report cannot be filed without knowing the specific addresses of the fraud, and Uber won't provide that without screenshots, but I don't have access to the fraudulent account, only to the credit card statements. Looks like I need to work with an attorney.
Submitted May 12, 2018 at 08:02AM by Stickboard https://ift.tt/2IfK9IH
