An important distinction between various types of credit card offenses was whether the offender had lawful possession of the card or whether the card had been unlawfully obtained by someone else. According to study findings, the card owner was responsible for about one-third of offenses. Most offenses, however, were committed with a card that the offender somehow obtained from its true owner. Most cases where the card owner misused the card involved exceeding the credit limit or using a bank card for payments even though insufficient funds were in the account. In several cases, a special credit card had been obtained on-the-spot in a shop, but credit purchases were not subsequently paid. A card belonging to someone else was usually used to buy goods and services. Offenders often succeeded in using a card to withdraw money from the owner's account at an automatic teller machine. A few fraud cases involved forged cards, attempts to obtain a credit card with false personal data, and attempts to take an imprint of the customer's card on extra receipts. Reports to the police did not always contain enough information to determine how the offender obtained the card. Usually, a stolen or otherwise unlawfully acquired card was not used to make very large individual purchases. Further, persons misusing a credit card generally acted alone. During 1988, credit card offenses caused a loss of about $2.5 million. References, tables, and figures