Credit card info stolen from Hilton. Thank you AMEX Fraud Protection

On Tuesday I received a text from American Express asking for an immediate response to if i had a $800 purchase on Latam Airways. I don’t like calling the number from a text so I called the number on back of my Platinum AMEX card. After putting in my account information that I was transferred to a live person.  They informed me the fraud alert wasn’t on my Platinum Card, but on my Hilton AMEX Card.  I have only had this card for about 2 months. I immediately confirmed that those charges were not mine and they informed me of 2 other charges from an hour ago on American Airlines for 1k euros. Again I confirmed those weren’t mine and they said no problem sir, we will take care of the rest as your are protected with AMEX.

As I have written about before, I have a lot of open credit cards and I check them every few days. I have had cases of fraud like this before, and I don’t get too worried about it because with 99% of credit cards, you are protected. The annoying thing is having to cancel this card and then get another one- which I received in 2 days from AMEX. Some people get really worked up, but it happens and will probably happen again with some other credit card down the road.

I was also trying to meet a min spend to get Hilton bonus points. With these Fraudulent charges, I actually met it and received the points. it will be interesting to see what happens when the statement closes and those charges aren’t there…. I will still make sure to meet the actual min spend by the required time.

Now I was down in South America for 2 weeks and had this card on me at all times. I only used it 2 times during the entire trip though. Both for stays at Hilton hotels. Once at the Hilton in Guayaquil, and the other time at the Waldorf Astoria in Panama. As you can see, Guayaquil is where some of the flights on the fraud charges were originating from.  I will be contacting Hilton as well to let them know and see what their response is.