My friend was truly panicked. Last week, American Express called on a recorded line, to verify a recent credit card application. She had not applied for credit and they suggested she put a fraud alert on her social security number. She did so with TransUnion only. Yesterday, Capital One called on a recorded line to […]
Sound Sense from Susan
Speaker, Author, Consultant, Fraud Examiner
Virtual Kidnapping – It Is All Too Real
April 4, 2019Last night at 10:30pm, I had sleepily turned off the news when the phone rang. At that time of night, my heart stops a little and confusion set in all the more, especially when the caller ID looked as if I was calling myself. Curious, I answered. It was “Microsoft” to tell me that my […]
Writing Books
February 13, 2019It starts as an idea. My first thought of writing a book was in 1997. A dentist from Colorado called and wanted me to fly up to help him organize his financial information on QuickBooks. After discussing how much that would cost (flight, lodging, expenses, and fee), he blurted out in frustration, “You should just […]
Looking For Help In All The Wrong Places
January 17, 2019The voice on the other end of the phone was a very concerned doctor. He had just gotten off the phone with whom he thought was Intuit QuickBooks support. “I Googled™ QuickBooks support. I thought it was Intuit,” he said slowly. He wasn’t suspicious when the support person who answered had an accent, as he […]
The Art of Playfulness
January 7, 2019Playfulness– something we tend to lose if we take life and all the entanglements too seriously. My dad modeled playfulness to me at a very early age. He was a home builder, known for if you couldn’t get a hold of him (on the weekend, waiting for inspections, or just because it seemed like a […]
Happy New Year
December 31, 2018“May there always be work for your hands to do. May your purse always hold a coin or two. May the sun always shine on your window pane. May a rainbow be certain to follow each rain.” Happy New Year!
Merry Christmas
December 25, 2018“May your sweetest hopes come true, and make your Christmas bright for you.” Merry Christmas!
Passionate Students Provide Christmas Toys
December 18, 2018The time around Thanksgiving is maddening for college students. They are on the homeward stretch to finishing the semester, know which classes they stand borderline on a grade they do not want and are writing at all hours of the night to finish yet another paper to turn in the next day. Some have jobs […]
That Big Red Kettle
December 10, 2018One college Christmas break many years ago, I rang a bell for the Salvation Army kettle in North Dallas. It still seems like yesterday. Unfortunately, the weather those weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas were “typical Texas” – 80 degrees one day, 20 degrees the next. One of those bell ringing days was a bitter snowy […]
Social Media Enabled Scams
December 5, 2018This particular scam targets seniors. Grandparents are getting phone calls about one of their grandchildren. The grandchild is in some kind of legal trouble and needs money to bail them out. The caller has a lot of details about their grandkids. It sounds convincing. One senior even talked to his “grandson” who sounded like […]