Monday 10 August I got my Visa card statement. Some toerag had been using my card in England, where I haven't been since a four week trip just after the Gulf War in 1991.
That was my first, and last, trip outside Israel, where I have lived for 24 years. I don't even have a current passport as both my British and Israeli ones expired years ago and I didn't bother to renew them.
So in July some toerag used my Visa card for two National Express coach journeys, two large shopping trips to the same Tesco store, and as part payment on a BT bill.
My card was cancelled on 10 August by Visa, and was then shredded by me.
I have just had another phone call from the fraud department at Visa, asking me about payments made on my card from end July until 10 August when the card was cancelled.
Another payment to a different Tesco store, and payment for an 02 bill.
Yes, it will be sorted, but I've just had yet another call from Visa asking even more questions. And now they want me to fill in a form confirming that the payments weren't mine, even though they agree that they couldn't possibly be mine.
But I have to fill in and sign a form to repeat all the answers to all the questions they've now twice asked me.
Only the form will be in Ivrit - Hebrew - which I can't read, and I definitely can't write in Ivrit either, as when I worked here I was an English PA/office manager. Using English only.
And I don't have anyone who can help me with this form that they are going to send me, because no-one here speaks English, apart from the young woman who runs the little shop across the road with her husband.
And I don't want my personal business spread around the Moshav.
So just when I was looking forward to a day with no worries - heck, I've had more than my fair share lately - now I've got this form to worry about.
Oh how I wish I could say stuff the money - but it's now added up to more than a month's pension, and my pension [combination of disability pension and allowances, which are in place of, not in addition to a regular OAP] is barely enough to live on as it is.
No free prescriptions for OAPs or severely disabled people here. I get no rent allowance, no help towards adapting my home, none of the benefits that are standard in England - I had to pay for my hearing aid and have to buy the batteries - even things like incontinence pads have to be bought if needed.
And now some toerag in England is putting me through all this aggravation and worry, by having used my card.
And I have absolutely no idea how he/she could have gotten the number as the card has never been out of my sight and no-one else has ever seen it.
It's so stupid. Don't National Express, Tesco, BT, O2 etc know that the first four numbers on a Visa card show where the card is issued? Are they so stupid that they don't know that the card numbers show the card was issued in Israel?
If it wasn't for the dogs, I think I'd just like to go to bed and not wake up.
