Do remember to check your credit card statements against your receipts and your recollections. (Online banking means you can strike while the memories are fresh.) Today, I caught one of the movie ticket web sites billing me for a ticket order that the site had told me couldn’t be completed. I wound up buying the tickets at the theater; seeing the two lines on my statement right next to each other was an immediate red flag that something was wrong.
I called up, and the representative on the phone was immediately able to confirm that my purchase hadn’t gone through successfully, so I shouldn’t have been charged. Instead of fixing things on the spot, though, she took my name and number and promised to have her supervisor tell the accounting people to fix it. (Five points off for not giving your first responders authority to fix obvious objective mistakes.) Similarly, a friend (unfortunately, a blog-less friend, or I could just link to the story) recently caught a waitress trying to chisel a bigger tip by changing the amount on the signature slip.
So, yeah, don’t just balance your checkbook; balance your credit card, too.