legal advice requested, please

[Nate R]

Luckily, AMEX only made me responsible for the first $50.00 and nothing more

Luckily? That's the law.

[cornercamping]

Luckily? That's the law.

Hmm.. I couldn't tell ya.  I'm not trying to find out.  :P

[KBOlsen]

I have this credit monitor thing from Transunion, Equifax, Experian, and Chex Systems that monitors my credit, and check writing daily.  If anything changes at all on any of the credit agencies files on me, it sends me an email, and i can see what it is.  If someone runs my credit, 2 minutes later I get an email. It's definetly well worth the $99.00 a year.  2 years ago, I lost my wallet.  Some moron found it, and went to BestBuy with my AMEX.   His buddy worked there, and let him use my card to charge up almost $10K worth of stuff.  He bought TV's, DVD players, ect.   He's now in prison serving a 2-5 year sentence for Credit Card Fraud, and his buddy did a year in the County Jail for it.  AMEX prosecuted, Best Buy prosecuted, and so did I. Luckily, AMEX only made me responsible for the first $50.00 and nothing more.  The morons were on tape doing it, so they were busted red handed.  I lost my wallet, and within an hour, this moron is at Best Buy charging stuff.  Ever since then, I've subscribed to all kinds of credit monitoring stuff.  The Chex Systems thing is free, and alerts you if anyone tries to open a bank account in your name.  Every single bank damn near uses Chex Systems to screen for bad check writers.  For free, if you sign up, they will call you and ask if it is you before they tell the bank you are clear to open an account.  This stops some idiot with your ID from opening an account.  If it isn't you opening the account, they assist with nailing the person trying to do it.  Pretty neat, and free.

"well worth the $99.00 a year", or "Pretty neat, and free"?   ???

I made the mistake of co-signing on a car... which is how I ended up paying $25,000 for a $15,000 vehicle (he was upside-down on his trade-in, and because of his horseshit credit the interest rate was miserable).  He had convinced Ford Credit to defer three months' worth of payments... and by the time I got the first phone call from them, the car was 3 months in arrears on top of that.  I went to several different attorneys but sadly, there's not a lot that can be done.  Fortunately, I was able to "repossess" the vehicle and reverse the "buyer/co-buyer" names before it was paid off so that I would receive the title.

One consolation (if you can call it that)... in IL, if your name is on the loan then your name is on the title too.