Sushi has pretty much summarized the dangers ahead. There is no way to truly screen her calls other than you or your cousin being with her 24 hours a day. Allowing her the freedom of answering her phone, puts her at risk -- for physical, financial, and emotional harm. I'm also a "been there, done that." My mom used to think she was outsmarting telemarketers by telling them that she was a widow and in ill health, so she couldn't afford to buy their products. Some of the callers had her name and some address info. I'd tell her over and over again that she was saying too much and that the callers could come to the house. She'd promise to do better, but the next time I'd see her, she'd proudly relate how she told off a telemarketer. Eventually she moved to an assisted living facility and the situation was better. The address change in addition to the phone number change lessened the frequency of calls. When she moved into the memory care wing, her phone did not move with her. As far as doctors, etc., do what sushi recommends. Make yourself or your cousin the contact person. That's what I did with my mom even before she moved to assisted living. Perhaps you could "train" your mom to always defer to either you or your cousin when answering questions over the phone. For example, "I'm sorry. You need to talk to my daughter/niece about this. She takes care of everything for me." There's always the possibility of changing her phone number to a new and unlisted number.

"It just looks weird for the report to say "too many inquiries," "debt too high," and so on as the reason for our credit rating being lowered when those things have nothing to do with how we handle debt. " Huh? Of course those things matter - on average. That is what credit scores are - the average risk of people who display certain behaviors. People who apply for a lot of credit in a short period of time are bigger risks to lend to on average. People who use a lot of their credit lines are obviously bigger risks than people who only use a little - on average. Sure, you may intend to pay it off every month, but if you suddenly lose your job, the credit companies are a lot safer if you only have a small balance outstanding then if you had a large balance. If you want to manipulate the credit scoring system, it really isn't that hard. Just adopt the patterns of people who they judge to be the lowest risks. If your score is currently good enough to get everything you need, why bother though?

When there is fraud against the account, they will immediately close the existing account and reopen it with a new account number. They will then transfer any existing balances over to the new card number. If your last statement on the old card number did not show a transfer of $60, then their computers already redirected it to the new account. That could be a problem if the card number was already being abused, but it could have been something that didn't trigger their fraud department to investigate it (was it a repeat transaction or a pattern of spending in your account, etc...). Just because you do not 'activate' the new cards doesn't mean that the account is closed. Activation allows you to use the cards at PoS terminals through the credit clearing houses. So the disconnect was that when they changed your account number, they transfered your desire *not* to have statements sent through the mail... but by you not attaching the card number to your account at Citi, you would not have any notion that their was activity on your card. Citi was generous to refund you the fees I think. I hope they are able to amend your credit reports in time. So the moral of the story is: Never assume the business relationship is over unless you have a letter in your hand stating that your account has been closed either by Citi or by yourself.

For whatever reason, nothing I posted yesterday went through... Strange! With this one "friend", I had hidden her earlier but wanted to give it another shot so I could see her stuff now and again (forgot why I hid her in the first place). I don't know what I did, but now all she posted got into my notifications. I did have her set to "follow", which is what I have my other friends set to as well, yet they only get on my notifications if I have commented on something (and similar), while for her, everything she did prompted a notification! I didn't mention the notifications part at first because it didn't dawn on me that this is why it became a problem. All her notifications were drowning out everything else. I think it has stopped now though. Hellion, I get what you're saying, but seriously, some people have no internet-social-skills and though I have over 200 friends on my friends list, only about two or three out of them are posting left and right about every thought that goes through their heads. Or they will share everything they saw that they found somewhat interesting. You can think "oh, cool!" and leave it to that, but don't share EVERYTHING that was cool or funny or cute with everyone! It's too much! I used to know how to simply hide these people, but now I can't figure it out. It makes for a much more pleasant experience to be on FB when these people aren't stuffing my newsfeed constantly. I seriously feel like I need to tidy up, just like when I organize a drawer at home.