I was panicky. Along with the Visa and debit cards, my wallet had contained my driver's license, my business cards, my social security card and a health insurance card with Chris's social security number. It wasn't there now. Georgia, the employee who had helped me before, refrained from lecturing as she put a watch on missing checks, flagged fraudulent debits, and set the reimbursement process in motion. Bank cards issued under the Visa logo, as mine was, guarantee reimbursement within five days if the loss is reported promptly.
Many major banks reimburse even sooner, within two or three days.
At that point, I learned later, I should have closed the account and set up a new one. Georgia put a watch on the missing checks and, in what later turned out to be the most wishful of thinking, agreed that the thief would probably toss the wallet now that my cards had been canceled. Ironically, I had stashed the tuition money in the account only the week before to keep it out of harm's way during the lost-purse misadventure. Perfunctory police Later in the week it occurred to me to call the police, if not to recover my wallet then at least to put on record that someone had stolen my identification. There are horror stories aplenty about bad guys going on crime sprees using other people's identities.