You hear about this all the time. I would hope that one the people who do this would be convicted of fraud in criminal court and civially sued for all expenses incurred.

The falsify bank documents, using a fake social security number or even a real one (that wasn't issued to the cat.) I do believe these things would be a felony and they could and should face serious jail time.

Of course this breaks the bank's security. You use fake info, forged signature and made up ssn, you can get credit and everything else. Only way around it would be to require multiple parties to meet with the applicant face-to-face with assorted bio-evidence of their identity.

We don't have anything like a social security number here in Australia and from what I can tell the only thing she faked was the signature (and who's to say the cat can't sign)
The big problem was that the bank didn't do an identity check or inform the holder of the account that a second card had been issued.

now I understand, thanks

I love this comment from the electricity company:

"We never intended for people to sign up their pets as secondary account holders but we respect our customers' wishes," she said. "However, we doubt that their pets will be able to take full advantage of the service."

Best corporate response EVER!

my fav too

My son has a card in his name, my credit. If the cat doesn't abuse the card...I'm okay with it.

Damn cat has a better credit rating than I do... *grumble*

My favorite:

A Bank of Queensland spokeswoman said the credit card had been issued to the cat in error.

"We have investigated the issue and it appears the bank has made an error," she said.


Ya think, ma'am spokeswoman? One might guess that the cat's age, very likely less than 18, would have clued them in.