Do I need to shred balance transfer checks?

November 23, 2011 10:15 AM

Do I need to shred the monthly balance transfer checks my credit card company sends me? Could someone else use them if they found them in the trash, or intercepted the mail? And has anyone had luck stopping them?
posted by smackfu to Work & Money (13 answers total)

Shred 'em. I've had them stolen and used.

Right after the incident, I got BofA to stop, but a few months down the road, they started showing up again.
posted by hwyengr at 10:30 AM on November 23, 2011

I called up Citibank a few years ago and asked them to stop sending them to me, and they did. And it has held, so far, so it may depend on your bank.
posted by ambrosia at 10:37 AM on November 23, 2011

When I worked as a teller at a bank they told us that we should be suspicious of any transaction involving those checks as they were commonly used to commit fraud. Do what Hwyengr and Ambrosia said.
posted by VTX at 10:41 AM on November 23, 2011

Yes. Yes. No. I was with Chase, they said they would stop sending them when I called, that was a year ago, it hasn't stopped yet.
posted by magnetsphere at 10:45 AM on November 23, 2011

Someone stole my mail and used one. I was able to get the charge dropped from my statement, and I've since requested that my credit card company avoid sending me these checks.
posted by zombiedance at 10:51 AM on November 23, 2011

Coincidentally, there is a story on document shredding on the main MeFi page today.
posted by fairmettle at 11:34 AM on November 23, 2011

The best I've been able to accomplish is getting banks to only send them with the bill. But I'm okay with that, since I shred the bill once I've reviewed and paid it.

But I had to cancel two credit cards from banks that Just Wouldn't Listen and kept sending multiple sets of balance transfer checks per month.
posted by DaveP at 1:23 PM on November 23, 2011

Shred them. I had them stolen twice, my neighbor paid their mortgage one month and got some groceries the next. Chase had great customer service about it and reversed the charges immediately but refused to stop sending them.
posted by M Edward at 1:41 PM on November 23, 2011

Shred. Shred shred shreddy-shred SHRED.

You don't have to go out and buy an actual shredder: just be sure to rip them up into itsy-bitsy tiny pieces. Maybe you'd be lucky and nobody ever tried to use yours, but why risk it? Shred them, it's safer.
posted by easily confused at 2:35 PM on November 23, 2011

Thanks everyone. Not the answers I was looking for, but that's life and I guess I will continue to shred them. They are really my only mail that needs to be shredded, since statements and such are all online now, and I am lazy about it and end up with a pile of envelopes on my desk that say Chase or Citi on them.
posted by smackfu at 2:38 PM on November 23, 2011

My Mom has me shred them every month, and she has not had any luck getting them to stop sending them. She has never used one and she curses a blue streak when the envelope arrives with them every month.
posted by Mael Oui at 9:56 PM on November 24, 2011

I called them and asked them to stop sending me the statements. Haven't recd one since.
posted by bbyboi at 10:22 AM on December 18, 2011

*checks.
posted by bbyboi at 10:22 AM on December 18, 2011