American Century Transport Credit Card Number "hacked" shortly after providing over the phone Miami Florida

Contacted American Century Transport on Tuesday January 13th , 2009 and left a message regarding a quote that was provided to me to ship a vehcile from Canton, Michigan to San Jose California - 1 way. Quote provided was failry competitive at $815.00 and even though it was a bit more than my lowest bid for the transport the $300.00 FREE gas that was stated in the quote really became a compelling reason to allow them to ship the vehicle.
I was contacted by phone later in the day by a male represeting himself as CARL SMITH. Should have sent a red flag when he said his last name was SMITH, but I was blinded by the fact that I actually was going to believe that I would recieve $300.00 in gas over the next year if I allowed them to ship my vehicle.
I asked specfically about the gas vouchers that were allegedly going to be provided as was told that I would recieve a document that I needed to follow up on with one of the gas companies that I chose to obtain gas from and that I had to choose only one and be "loyal" to this company. I must admit this sounded reasonable. I was told that I would recieve between 25-50 Dollars a month in gas vouchers from the gas company I selected. I was told I could pick from Chevron, Citgo, BP and others...
Carl then told me he would transpose the information I gave him about shipping the vehicle onto a contract and send it to my email address. He did so and then I read it over and detemined that there were spelling mistakes and it stated that the vehicle did not run when actually it does run. I sent it back to him for corrections to be made that evening. He expected me to fax it in to him, but I had not.
The next day - TODAY January 14th 2009 Wends I recieved a call in the afternoon from Carl again and he stated that he had sent a corrected version fo the contract back to my email address and it needed to be signed and faxed back as soon as possible. I was not able to get to my email till later in the day and told him I would get to it later in the day. We hung up.

Then no less than 30 minutes later he calls me back and asks if I am anywhere near a place where I can get internet acess and if I would be able to get email. He told me that he needed that contract signed right away and that he needed it to allow him to get my car scheduled with the trucking company so it would ship by the 18th of January 2009. I found this pressure tactic odd and intrusive! I stated I was no where near a place to gain access to email and would work on it later in the day (once again)!

A lightbulb started to burn in my brain- very faintly at first, but then increasingly brighter and it dawned on me that a company that has plenty of business and is transporting lots of vehicles and is profitable would not need to resort to calling someone back so quickly and trying to "coerce" them into sending a form immediately. They would remind one and follow up, but not pressure them.

So that rattled around in my brain and I was beginning to sour on the idea of allowing them to ship my vehicle by the time I returned home today. Then a BOMBSHELL went off after arriving home and cheking my email. I was greeted by an email from Bank Of America stating that there had been suspicious activity on the Credit Card (VISA) that I gave a day prior to American Century Transport and they had disabled the card and I needed to call them immediately.
I called and was informed that there were 2 transactions conducted today that were for the same amount of $4138.00 and then one for $350.00.
I checked my online banking and sure enough these transactions were processed and left my account seriously overdrawn.
Bank of America apologised profusely during this time and told me I would not be responsible for the charges. They credited the amounts back to mky account and got me setup with a new card. They then called the merchant with me on the other line and determined that the transactions for the large amounts $4138.00 (x2) were conducted by a call in to place an order and that the items were to be shipped to SINGAPORE!!! I was never told what these items were , but judging by the type of merchant they were I would conjecture to say video editing gear and /or large hard drive arrays - i.e. RAID.

Bank of America was able to save me from the fraud and credit the funds back to my account immediately as I told them I would be placed in a "hardship" circumstance if I was to wait the prescribed 24-48 hours for the refund. The also stopped the merchant from shipping approximlately $8200.00 of goods out of the country to SINGAPORE! Win - WIn!

I will not directy accuse American Century Transport of providing the very credit card number that I gave them one day ago to a person or entity so that it may be used for fraudulent purposes, but I will say that this incident of fraud certainly did happen in a very short time frame after the credit card information was provided ao American Century Transport.
You be the judge!
I have since cancelled any notion of shipping any vehicle with them and feel fortunate to have not been dupped into the FRAUDULENT gas card scam and am now much wiser with who I provide my credit card information to.

Just like your parents always say , "If something seems too good to be true - then it probably is". Such simple words with such a genuine meaning.

I have blocked thier email address and phone number so perhaps they can understand what its like to not have someone acknowledge thier calls or email inquiries as they appear to use that technique frequently as noted in the other rippoff reports filed by others.

I think that they will eventually get a delivery as well from the "karma-police".

Bruce
San Jose, California
U.S.A.