You Lying, Cheating Low-Life!

You know, even though I get sick of talking to idiots who can't figure out their bills, the one person I loath above all else is the fraudster of the elderly and incapacitated. I have good news for all of you low-lifes who do this---you're going to hell!

So many times I've had to take calls from grandmothers and others who have discovered their children or caretakers have stolen their identities and fraudulently opened accounts in their names. I guess these slimeballs figure their charges are too old to care or won't be around to dispute any claims against their good names.

At one of the credit companies I worked for, I got a call from this elderly lady, let's call her BigMama, who had found a credit account in her name. It seems her granddaughter (we'll call her Dog) had fraudently opened an account and charged almost $16k on junk for her deadbeat boyfriend. The old lady was so upset when she called me that even I, the jaded phone rep was near tears. She told me was 83 and had gotten sick but her 33-yr old granddaughter had come to live with her and take care of her. Dog handled all the bills and BigMama only happened upon the bill because a neighbor had brought in the mail.

I had to explain to BigMama that she would have to pay the account or her credit would be tarnished. I also suggested she call the cops on Dog and file criminal charges because her dumb granddaughter shouldn't have abused her like that.

Of course BigMama made all kinds of excuses for Dog: she's had a hard time, she's a good girl, she must have thought she could pay it, etc etc. Both BigMama and I knew Dog, with her sorry tail, wasn't going to do anything about paying that money back. I wanted to find Dog and beat her down after what she had done to her grandmother.

A friend shared this story of a private nurse finding her charge's checks and almost putting the poor old guy in bankruptcy by spending about $130k before the bank alerted the guy's son about the large sums that were being withdrawn. So, where was this guy's son in all of this and why wasn't he keeping better watch over his daddy's business? By the time they caught up with the nurse most of the money was gone so all they could do was ship her to prison.

At the call center we would get the calls where the children stole their parents' cards and spent money. Of course the parents then called us and blamed US for allowing the charges to go through! I'm sorry, are we supposed to teach your bad-assed kids morals? Hell-to-the-no! These people actually tell us we should eat the charges because Jr. didn't have to show ID when using the card. We always come back with, "Either pay the money or file police charges against Jr." We really want to say, "Listen, idiot! Give Jr. a good beat-down, pay the money and take all Jr.'s designer clothes, his stereo, iPOD, shoes, car, Sidekick, Xbox, spending money and make him get a job to pay you back." Why you people think we're responsible for your bad kids is amazing!

This link is an interesting article about how rampant ID theft is in the elderly community. Read it when you have time and remember, the moral of this story is after you give your parent over to the care of some stranger, make sure you're checking up on him. If you don't and thieves take all his money, he'll have to move back in w/you and you'll have to clean that bedpan. Understand?