AARP Hearing Center
What to Do if Your Wallet Is Lost or Stolen
7 steps to prevent identity theft and money loss — plus how to replace what’s missing
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Key takeaways
- If your wallet gets in the wrong hands, you’re at risk of identity fraud.
- Acting quickly to lock and cancel your credit cards and to freeze your credit can minimize the damage.
- Follow our tips for replacing what’s been lost, and consider carrying only the essentials.
You reach for your wallet to settle up a bill and find … nothing. Panic sets in as you frantically pat down your pockets or fumble around the contents of your purse. It’s gone. Losing whatever cash you may have on hand is bad enough, but the other items in your wallet can be a treasure trove for criminals, who can go on to perpetrate credit card and identity fraud.
The silver lining: Act fast and you can minimize much of the potential damage. Here’s where to start.
1. Lock, then cancel your debit and credit cards
If you’re unsure whether your wallet is irretrievably lost, the first thing you should do is call the bank or credit card companies that issued the cards and place a lock on your accounts. If you haven’t found it by the following morning, cancel the cards and request replacements with new account numbers. (If you know it’s lost or stolen, do it right away.)
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Deal with your debit card first. “The debit card is the gateway into your bank account,” says Adam Levin, founder of CyberScout, author of Swiped: How to Protect Yourself in a World Full of Scammers, Phishers, and Identity Thieves. “If someone steals your credit card and uses it, they’re spending the credit card company’s money,” he notes.
With a credit card, you have 60 days to report your loss, and you will owe no more than $50 for unauthorized charges. The terms are less friendly when it comes to debit cards. By federal law, you have two business days to refute unauthorized charges on a debit card. If you report within two business days of learning about the theft, the most you may be liable for is $50. If you report it more than two business days after the incident, your maximum loss is $500. Report it after 60 calendar days, and you could be liable for the entire amount stolen.
2. Freeze your credit
With your driver’s license in hand, a thief has enough information to do some serious damage. Putting a freeze in place blocks lenders and creditors from accessing your credit report, so someone else won’t be able to take out credit in your name.
“If lenders can’t see your scores, they don’t know what their risk quotient is, so they’re not going to issue that new card or approve that loan,” says cybersecurity expert and private investigator Robert Siciliano.
Contact each of the three national credit reporting bureaus — Experian, TransUnion and Equifax — to place a free freeze on your credit. (Read our story for more on how to freeze your credit and why you’d want to).
Alternatively, you could place a fraud alert on your credit. A fraud alert requires lenders to verify your identity before approving a new credit request or changing existing accounts. It’s a little easier than a credit freeze - contacting one of the bureaus will extend the fraud alert to the others. But they last only one year and aren’t as protective as a credit freeze.
3. Visit IdentityTheft.gov
To obtain a personalized recovery plan tailored to your specific circumstances, visit IdentityTheft.gov. The information you receive about the recovery plan will be helpful for the next step: contacting law enforcement.
4. File a police report
Call your local precinct to get a police report on record. Even if the police can’t recover your missing wallet, it’s crucial to have it on hand.
With a police report, you have evidence of theft in case someone tries to use your info for fraud. “This is for your own protection,” says Chelsea Binns, former president of the New York Chapter of the Association of Certified Fraud Examiners and assistant professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City. Also, she says, if someone finds your wallet, a filed police report will have your contact info so the items can be returned to you quickly.
5. Set up fraud alerts for your bank and credit cards
Depending on what services your bank or credit card offers, you can sign up to receive account activity alerts by email or text message. This will allow you to catch suspicious transactions immediately.
6. Keep an eye on all of your accounts
Thieves can’t keep using a card once you’ve shut down the account, but that doesn’t mean you should stop checking your monthly paper statements and monitoring your online bank and credit card accounts for suspicious withdrawals or charges you don’t recognize. Be alert to small withdrawals: Sometimes thieves will process a small debit or charge to your account to see if it will go through, then return to withdraw larger amounts.
Fraudulent charges to your card or debits to your bank account might occur many months after the theft of your information. “They can do it in a subtle way, because many people don’t necessarily check their bank accounts on a daily basis,” Levin says. “By the time you find out that there’s something amiss, there could be a great deal gone.”
7. Contact the IRS
If you’ve lost your Social Security card, contact the IRS and report it stolen in the event that a thief tries to file a tax return in your name. The agency can provide you with a PIN each tax filing year, which will indicate to them that it's you filing the return.
How to replace what’s been lost or stolen
Driver’s license. When someone has your license, they can perpetrate all kinds of fraud, including opening credit cards, taking out loans, changing your address and receiving your mail (including new credit cards), and filing for unemployment benefits in your name. You also need a license to drive legally, of course. Check your state’s official DMV website to find out how to do so. The process varies by state; some allow you to apply for a replacement online. You’ll typically pay a small fee (anywhere from $5 to $34).
Medicare card. You should never carry your card unless you need it on the way to a provider. If it gets stolen, report it to Medicare online or by calling 800-MEDICARE (800-633-4227).
Other health insurance cards. If you’ve lost a health insurance card from a private plan, file a request for a new card online or by phone. Representatives should be able to guide you through the process of obtaining a new one. Check your Explanation of Benefits summaries regularly for fraudulent use.
Video: What to Do if Your Wallet Is Lost or Stolen
Be proactive
- Do a wallet edit: Pull everything out of your wallet or purse, and put back only the things you use frequently. (Read our story “15 Worst Things to Carry in Your Wallet.”)
- Keep a list of every item you end up keeping in your wallet, along with contact information, in a safe place. Consider scanning or taking smartphone photos of cards and documents (fronts and backs) and saving them to your computer.
- Give yourself easy access to your bank or credit card company’s customer service numbers. You might keep them in your phone’s contacts, so you can reach out quickly in case of a theft.
- Get a GPS tracking device. Some wallets can be purchased with the trackers already built in. You can also add GPS tags, which are small, to your wallet and monitor them online or through a mobile app.
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