Consumer complaint received 2024-09-18
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service — Mobile or digital wallet
Issue: Fraud or scam — 
Company: DISCOVER BANK (TX)

Someone hacked one of my and my fianc 's friend 's XXXX account and proceeded to post a used car for sale. My fianc, thinking she was talking to our mutual friend via XXXX told me our friend had a car for sale, and asked me about buying the car for one of our children. I was in the middle of playing a gig ( I am a musician ) and when I came on break she showed me the ad our friend had posted. It looked like a good deal, so I told her to ask him where to send the money, and since I was out of town playing a show that night, we'd go pick up the vehicle from him the next day. The scammer ( who my fianc still believed was our mutual friend, instructed her to send the money via XXXX to XXXX XXXX and explicitly told us to use the " friends and family '' payment method. Being that I THOUGHT we were dealing with a friend that fact didn't ring alarm bells. I sent the money Through XXXX having them bill my Discover credit card and went on with my show thinking I had just bought my daughter a nice used car. 

However, on the very next break, my fianc informed me she had discovered, all too late, that our friend 's XXXX account had been compromised. The hackers had locked him out of the account, he had no control over anything, nor did he have any used vehicle for sale. During that very break, less than one hour removed from the time I sent the payment, I contacted Discover card, and told them I had just been scammed. The charge was still pending at the time. They did nothing to stop it from going through. I attempted to dispute the charge online with XXXX that night because their customer service didn't open until XXXX XXXX  the following morning, but apparently I picked the wrong option and my dispute was immediately dismissed because I had authorized the charge. I stayed up all night, and did contact XXXX as soon as their customer service opened for business, and attempted to initiate several disputes online with them as well. They told me, in a nutshell, that since I used " friends and family, '' there was nothing they could do and I would need to dispute the charge with Discover. I attempted to do so as soon as I finished talking to them, but to no avail. 

Discover made me wait 11 business days to file a dispute with XXXX who did an investigation and found that I had no recourse because of sending the money " friends and family. '' They ruled against me and sent the scammer the money. Discover sent me an email telling me tough luck, and I called them both again to make sure there was nothing else I could do. According to them, there isn't. So I did some research and finally ended up here. I hope someone can help me. This is wrong on so many levels. I found out I had gotten scammed less than an hour after sending the money. The transaction had not even posted and was STILL in " pending '' status when I contacted my credit card company and asked them to cancel it. This could have been prevented. 

My fianc has screenshots of her conversation with the scammer posing as our friend, then after seeing that his account had been hacked, she contacted him via text message ( instead of XXXX XXXX  ) and he confirmed he had been hacked and that wasn't him selling any car. I've got the documentation that someone defrauded me out of XXXX. XXXX knows who it is. Knows that person is a scammer, and still allows them to go on scamming people. And Discover Card could have simply canceled the transaction when they learned it was FRAUDULENT.