Personal finance blogger Carrie… On the Cheap put together a checklist of things you should do once you’ve found out your identity has been stolen.

Step one, of course, is to cancel any credit card that’s been swiped. It’s the second step that too many people forget, she writes:

Most people forget this step until it’s too late. After I had cancelled my card, it quickly dawned on me how many automatic bill payments I had filtering through that very credit card on a monthly basis.

After you’ve cancelled your card, you’ll have to go through and switch every automatic payment from that credit card to another card or bank account.

This is the catch-22 with those handy-dandy automatic bill payments – they can always come back to haunt you if your credit card changes or expires (or gets hijacked by some scammer halfway across the globe forcing you to cancel your card).

The tongue-in-cheek step 3 is my favorite — track down the jerks who stole your credit to exact sweet revenge.

What You May Be Forgetting When You’re The Victim Of Identity Theft [Carrie… On the Cheap]
(Photo: scenemissingmagazine)

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