Amazon does not want my money...

Back story: I received a phone call, a couple weeks ago, from my bank. It was automated message telling me that "Some large charges were attempted" on my bank card. I called the service back and what I heard was so shocking that I had to "ask" the machine to repeat what it was saying, because I could just not believe the facts. Someone had tried to buy $3,400 worth of Cristian Dior items in Paris (France) using my number.

Needless to say, I was not in Paris at the time of these purchases. Needless to say, I'd never purchase $3,400 worth of anything at one time.

So, the friendly people at Washington Mutual stopped the charges, then promptly canceled my card. (Which is a whole 'nother headache of a story, as, at the time, I only had $40 in my pocket and would have to wait over a week for the new card to arrive. Turns out, I can manage a week on $40 - take THAT, Rachael Ray!)

Anyway. So, one of the things I had to do was update any of my bills that would auto-draw from my checking account. Which I did.

I received my new card (actually, TWO cards - ANOTHER headache!) and all was, again, right with my financial world...

However, a week ago, I decided to purchase an MP3 album from Amazon's MP3 store. (Rage Against the Machine's "Evil Empire", if you MUST know.) I'd totally forgotten about 2 things, by this point:
1 - That my old, canceled card was linked to my Amazon account.
2 - That I'd turned on "1-Click" purchasing for MP3 albums.

So, I clicked purchase and the album immediately started downloading. It was at this point that I had the thought cross my mind: "Did I update my credit card info?"

Well, no, I didn't. Before the album finished downloading, I was trying to change the method of payment. Turns out, for a digital purchase, you can't do such a thing. So, I waited and wondered was was going to come of this...

An angry letter from Jeff Bezos, perhaps?

Well, I DID receive a letter - via e-mail - telling me that they could not successfully charge my card, and that my purchases would be canceled.

Now, I'd already downloaded the album. So, I opened up my music folder, and - even though I knew there was no way they could do this - expected the music to be missing... or at least unable to play. I was wrong on both accounts. I still had the music, and it still played.

Well, it was never my intent to dupe the giant corporation, nor steal from them, so I wanted to put this right. I'd bought the album - I wanted to pay for it.

So I went to Amazon and found their "contact us" page and used their nifty "Call me back" feature. In a couple of seconds my phone rang. The hiss of static on the line let me know that my case was important enough for someone in India to make a long-distance call to set things right.

I explained the situation, and I was met with silence. After a pause, I resumed my case, pleading, "I didn't MEAN to steal. I just want to pay for what I bought."

Another moment of stunned silence followed. Right now, I could only imagine what the operator on the other end of the line was thinking. (Probably the same thing a cop thinks when a criminal turns himself in... that being, "WHY?!"... Well, either that, or he was scrolling through all of the computer-based answers to find the correct response to "Fraudulent purchasers is calling to make good on payment - which is probably buried way deep in the page, as it's not often used.)

Finally, the operator chuckles a bit and says, "Well, thank you for your honesty... ummm... but digital download transactions are charged at the point of purchase. We CAN'T charge you again. What you can do, is re-purchase the album, if you REALLY want to be charged for the purchase."

"Oh... Okay," I said, "Well, thanks...."

And that was it. The call was over. But it got me thinking... Shouldn't they have a way to make sure the card works before they allow you download an album. Then the evil side of me wondered, "How many albums could I download albums with a canceled credit card before they got wise?"

Well, as I like my status as a free man and as I'm deathly afraid of prison, I'm not going to be the one to do that experiment. But there are people out there who will try just such a thing. It's an interesting little problem.

I wonder if they're working on fixing it, or if - since it's digital downloads - they're not really losing too much money every time something like this happens and so are not really bothered by it?