Wouldn’t you like to go to a gas station and not worry about your credit card information being stolen? 

It’s a scary world out there with all of these fraudulent activities happening all around us.

You almost don’t know who you can trust or not. Whether it’s large organizations such as Equifax, Anthem, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, ADT…the list goes on, you don’t know who is liable of leaving you vulnerable for the next fraudulent activity.

I read an article titled “New Tech Leads to Spike in Credit Card Skimmers” by Kyle Arnold with the Orlando Sentinel years ago. It’s a great article where he explains how technology is leaving lots of consumers who use their credit cards at gas stations vulnerable to potential fraudulent activity such as stolen identity. Then unscrupulous people having access to your credit card information which can be a big mess by itself.

All it takes is one innocent transaction…which could ultimately lead to your credit card information getting stolen

You have to protect yourself; including your identity and even possibly your credit ratings. It’s a big mess that continues to happen all across the country. Obviously, a lot of these situations are happening right here in your own backyard. It’s definitely happening in South Florida as well.

Do you want to avoid this issue all together?

One solution stood out to me as a way you can avoid possibly getting scammed by credit card skimmers at gas stations.

When you go food shopping at a supermarket such as Publix, purchase gas gift cards for yourself.

It’s simple! Purchase a gas gift card at your local supermarket!

When you go food shopping at the supermarket, make an extra purchase by stopping by the gift card rack and purchase a gas gift card on your way out.

More than likely, there shouldn’t be fraudulent activity at your local supermarket since their credit card machines are being watched and used quite frequently. Then use the gift card at the gas station.

Worst comes to worse, the balance of your gas gift card could become compromised. That’s possibly the worst case scenario. That’s much better than issues occurring with your credit card or debit card.

At least you would avoid any issues with stolen identity and the aftermath you would have to deal with. To me, that’s a winning solution to avoiding credit card skimmers at gas stations.

Here are a few additional thoughts I wanted to share with you:

• On the larger scale of things and thinking about fraudulent activity overall, check out this class action database of current class action listings that are pending for you to possibly opt into.
• When you purchase your gas gift card, ask for the gift card activation receipt.
• Let’s say you purchased a $50 gas gift card at the supermarket. Then you purchase $30 worth of gas using the same gas gift card and get the printed receipt at the gas pump at the gas station. You can easily spot your balance instead of checking by phone or website. You can also take a photo of the gas pump if the receipt doesn’t print out.
• Sometimes I use a mini-sticky pad and just write down the balance after I use it the first time so I don’t have to keep an additional receipt or two.
• Keep this attached to your gas gift card. I usually use a rubber band or paper clip gift card receipt.
• I’m a big advocate of purchasing my gas gift cards at Publix; especially when they have their coupon offer for $10 off gas gift cards.
• No matter what you do, nothing is a certainty, but if you can avoid one extra hassle in your life then purchase gas gift cards when you go food shopping at the supermarket to avoid having larger concerns of your identity being stolen from your credit card due to a credit card skimmer at the gas station.

I would appreciate it if you could please comment with your thoughts and let me know what you think. 🙂