Thanks to Citi Cards for Their Protection

Do you have some sort of electronic access to your Citi card statement. Look at where/when the last charge was that YOU made and see if that triggers a clue to where the card might be.

Good luck.

The card has been cancelled. There's no reason to keep spending a lot of time looking for it. If you still have it, you'll eventually come across it when you least expect it. If it was lost or stolen, you'll never find it. Your newly issued card will be different.
Sometimes you'll have the card in your possession, and yet somehow someone fraudulently gains access to your card. There's no telling.

It's a reminder that it's always a good idea to check your statement! Glad you made it back safely!

This happened to me too a couple of weeks ago when I was in Azerbaijan or Georgia. I was using my card for most purchases and suddenly there were 4 purchases made in Brazil. I have a feeling that my card details may have gotten out with the Booking.com breach. Anyway, the card was cancelled and a new one sent which arrived home before I did. To me this is just the new reality with so many points of failure when traveling.

Well done Citi Card. I’m in the group that encourages you to let go of trying to find the card. We got hacked two separate times last fall and had the cards. The hack could have happened months ago and they just waited to use the numbers. We had letters from assorted vendors like third party healthcare vendors and Ticketmaster that were hacked, so who knows where they get the numbers. The important thing is that Citi stopped it.

I had just the opposite happen. Citibank blocked my card from use and I found out when I tried to use it while checking in at a hotel.

I had submitted a travel notice so I was confused. It took over an hour on the phone to get the card cleared and I'm now able to use it.

And this is why it's risky to use debit cards when travelling, since the bad guys reach directly into your checking account and poof the money's gone. With a credit card, at your leisure you call them and say I didn't charge that and it's up to them to do the legwork.

CC theft is just a part of everyday life. Every few years it's bound to happen to us all.

Why do take a Citi card to Europe? Does it not charge the Foreign Transaction fee? My Citi does charge the FT fee , which is why it stays home. True, Citi is alert to strange charges as a way to determine if they are actually yours , This sort thing happened to me once ages ago when I charged twenty dollars here in CA for gasoline, was contacted right away by Citi. It was indeed my charge . None of my credit card s is set up with auto payment.

Are you sure the Citi was lost or taken from you in France, never had either one ever happen to me. No need to find the card, you have new a Citi card now with a different account number , obviously.

Fred,
Just a guess, but i have found that all the banks offering cards have more than one type of card. BofA, for instance, has Visas with no foreign transaction fees, some with annual fees, some co-branded ones, some with fees....you get the point. I would guess that Citi has some FTF-free cards as well. So taking a Citi card may be what works for a person.

When we travel, we use the Citi Visa card from Costco. Several nice features:

No currency conversion transaction fee. 2% cash back for restaurants and travel-related purchases worldwide. Rental car insurance outside the US is primary, not secondary. I think car rentals made with this card also provide for a second driver at no surcharge (at least for some agencies).

We have the "Executive" level membership at Costco, so there is an annual fee for that. I don't know if these features are associated with non-Executive memberships, or other branded Citi cards.

Thank you for your responses. I do not yet have time to respond individually but I will as I get more settled in.

I agree that it is time to stop looking for the physical card. Maybe I will find it in the future but most tlikely not.

But even when I spoke to Citi, I did not realize that I had lost the physical card. After speaking to Citi, I went to look for my card and confirm that I had given them the correct last digits and only then did I realize I had lost my card.

Until then, I just assumed that someone had managed to get hold of my card number and the security code.

I did not even know that I had lost my physical card. So glad for Citi's security.

Fred in San Francisco

I believe that my Citi Card has no foreign fees

I use it a lot because it is partnered with American Airlines and one day I hope that I will have earned enough rewards to use for international travel. I have enough for domestic travel but not yet enough for international travel.

I use both my Citi and Delta Amex a lot but I have also learned that not every place takes Amex any longer so I have Citi also available.

I set up automatic payment when I went to Japan in September / October. I was going on a long trip, for me, and I did not want to risk any late payment. It became easy to continue with automatic payment. I also continue to receive my bill in the mail and I do monitor my bills but as I have just found out, it can be risky to remain on automatic payment.

I used my Citi Card a lot when in Paris including the last day.

The last day was cab fares, the Ibis Hotel, and a few meals. And I had all my luggage and I was tired.

I was lax. I sometimes held it in my hand when I should have put it away because I was moving so fast. There were times when I needed help with using it.

Frank II

Same thing happened to me when I went to Japan in September.

I called and reported travel to Citi as well as other cards.

When I attempted to pay the hotel with Citi, it was not allowed.

Fortunately, i was able to use my Amex. Did not realize that many establishments no longer take Amex.because of high fees.

I had to call Citi's fraud dept from Japan in order to have it unlocked which was costing me something like 11 cents a minute. But also fortunately, the call only took a few minutes. I know that sometimes the call can take an hour. Yesterday it was a long call but toll free.

Back to Japan. I was so mad but yesterday I was so gratelful.

But you might also remember that I got bilked rebooking air from Austin to Tokyo. And that was with my Citi / American card. So perhaps Citi was being overly cautious when I tried to check in at the hotel????

joe32F

I do have electronic access to my Citi statement and I looked but not all charges had yet been posted. I used it a lot the day I left so I will keep checking.

I do know that the fraudulent charge was to ebay in Australia. Citi sent me the transaction. Need to go back and check again. I was so tired that I was having trouble processing information.

I may have just lost my card but it might also have been a merchant where I used my card.

Need to be more cautious when traveling. I was lax. Did not always put my citi card away carefully.

bostonphil7, positive threads are nice. Thank you.

Citi's my oldest creditor, and I agree they're quick to identify concerns. Glad they notified you and closed the card.

One note: The no annual fee AA Mile Up card (teal color) DOES have the 3% foreign transaction fee. Their higher-level annual fee cards do not. You'd have to know which you have.

Every airline's different with their basic card, though. For example, United/Chase's Gateway is no annual fee and no foreign transaction fee.

Hi, , Thanks for the detailed reply. The chain hotels as pointed out above in Germany and France, ie Ibis, Motel One , Novotel (expensive) , Intercity , Campanile , Mercure , etc do take AmEx...you can be certain of that the next time visiting France. When I stay in these list hotels I use the cc too.

@ Judy....True, banks and others offering cards, eg, Marriott, United, etc do offer various credit cards , those with FT fees and those without. In that regard my Citic MC is only for domestic use, obviously.

One virtue to using Google Wallet (or similar) is that you have a virtual version of your credit card, the number changes with each use. My Chase card was compromised just as I left for switzerland in January, they just issued (instantly) a new number to my Google Wallet. Never needed to touch card in either Switzerland or France last year.

It is great that you actually lost your card; I have had my card compromised many times -- probably from on line capture -- without losing it. once my new card still unused by me, was stolen and used before I ever received it. There are lots of ways to get ahold of credit card data and misuse it.

Thank you for posting, bostonphil7. We all benefit from other people's difficult experiences. Glad things are working out OK.