Out of the more than one million EagleBucks transactions that occur in a year, Housing and Dining Programs typically receives 10 to 20 reports of merchant misuse, according to Executive Director Chris Moody.
There have been seven merchant-related incidents reported to Housing and Dining since August, and three cases of student-to-student fraud in the past two years, Moody said.
However, one particular incident occurred Tuesday at the Domino’s on Wisconsin Avenue that is not included in these numbers. The store accidentally charged $60 to a student who never actually ordered any food when someone else had fraudulently used another EagleBucks account, according to Domino’s Manager Ray Amit.
The deliveryman forgot to ask for the AU ID, he said.
“It’s our fault; we take the blame,” Amit said. This is the second incident in the past six months, since Amit became the manager.
Assistant Manager Steve Henry said he believes the drivers rarely check for identification.
“I’m pretty sure most of the times, they don’t,” he said.
Most merchant incidents occur because of human error, Moody said. Most problems include duplicate charges, where two swipes are registered as payment rather than just one and delayed transactions, which occur when the Internet connection is offline.
Any merchants who are found to violate the Merchant Service Agreement, a private contract between individual merchants and AU, receive a letter of warning or have the agreement terminated, Moody said. Undercover test purchases are also made to ensure that a merchant is complying with the agreement.
Student-to-student fraud, however, carries Student Conduct as well as legal implications, according to Moody.
Two of the three incidents in the past two years were related to a roommate or friend stealing the AU ID card from another student and using it to make fraudulent charges, Moody said.
Class of 2012 Senator Seth Rosenstein is sponsoring a Student Government bill to reduce such fraudulent activity with EagleBucks accounts, after his own account was similarly compromised last semester.
“There’s been a problem on campus — it doesn’t affect many students, but it does affect some - where students’ EagleBucks accounts are being used to call in takeout orders for delivery to campus and their accounts are being used to fund the orders,” he said. “And often times, students have no idea that their accounts are being used until it’s too late.” Rosenstein’s account was charged with $147 worth of purchases to Domino’s and Satay Club. Housing and Dining eventually refunded all of the fraudulently used EagleBucks.
The bill unanimously passed the Committee of Campus Life and Programming, of which Rosenstein is chairman, went to the Undergraduate Senate and was sent back to committee for changes, according to Rosenstein.
The bill currently requires delivery-people to confirm the student’s ID number upon arrival, something Moody said is already in place.
According to the Merchant Service Agreement, the “merchant will verify by visual inspection that the person in possession of the EagleBucks Card is the person pictured in the photo on that photo ID card prior to accepting an EagleBucks Card payment for the delivery of goods and services.”
Rosenstein said this rarely occurs to him.
“I know for sure that very few times when I order for delivery do they ever check my ID,” he said. “I can think of once in the past year.”
The bill also requires restaurants to keep records of the telephone number and residence location for each EagleBucks order for 90 days, as “a way to backtrack every order and figure out where the fraud is coming from,” Rosenstein said.
The Merchant Service Agreement already requires merchants to keep payment slips for no less than 365 days from the transaction date.
The payment slip contains the AU ID number and transaction cost, Moody said. “Each merchant’s ordering system is different, so we would have to work with each merchant individually when their current agreement is reviewed for renewal to determine the feasibility of also keeping the telephone and residence hall for 90 days.”
Domino’s keeps the receipt, signature, ID number, telephone number and residence hall for every EagleBucks-funded order forever, Amit said.
“You can go back five years and still find out,” he said. The records are never erased.
For Tuesday’s alleged theft, Amit said the telephone number is on record. The perpetrator should be easily identified “if his phone number is not a stolen phone.”
The last section of the bill requires the creation of a committee of university officials and students to explore further safeguards to secure EagleBucks accounts from fraudulent activity.
It was this last clause that brought the bill back to committee, for some senators “did not see the purpose behind that,” Rosenstein said.
However, a committee like this already exits in the form of the Dining Services Project Team, Moody said. The team is a representative group of students, faculty and staff who give feedback on issues related to dining services and EagleBucks.
The bill may be amended in the next Senate session Sunday, Rosenstein said. Changes most likely to be made will encourage Housing and Dining Programs to require merchants to keep telephone numbers and residence halls.
Housing and Dining welcomes feedback but does not think the bill will change anything related to merchant misuse, Moody said.
“I understand the rationale for the bill, but there will likely continue to be this many reports in future years given that human error is a potential factor [from either the cashier or delivery person] when ordering delivery services from off-campus,” he said.
You can reach this staff writer at sdazio@theeagleonline.com.
