pickpocketed on the metro
The public address warning, on the light rail train going from Charles de Gaulle Airport to central Paris, was in French and English, and repeated several times: watch out for pickpockets.
And I had watched out. My wallet was not temptingly obvious in back, but was in a front closed and zippered pocket of my pants. Still, it was no match for the pickpocket.
We had exited the light rail at Chatelet, and made the long correspondance to Metro Ligne 7, direction Mairie d’Ivry. It was mid-afternoon, but the metro train was crowded, all seats taken with a number of riders standing, clustered tightly by the doors. We pushed our way forward, trying to wedge in our suitcases and backpacks.
Did we look like easy marks, an older couple laden with too much stuff?
As we entered, we were both jostled a bit while a tall, well-built man in his thirties gallantly lifted my wife’s suitcase and placed it down, offered her a seat and then tried to offer me one. Soon a seat did open up and as I sat down, I reflexively tapped my left front pocket, where the wallet had been safely stowed, making sure it was there.
It was not. The zipper was open. The wallet was gone.
It had all happened very quickly. Would it have happened if we were younger? Would it have been so disastrous or problematic if we were younger? Who knows.
My wife immediately called out to the other passengers asking if they’d seen the wallet, but when I told her my pocket was zipped open, she shouted that “son portefeuille a eté volé.” A young French woman said the man who’d helped my wife with her bag had hurried off at the next station, Pont Marie, and must have been the thief.
He was most definitely gone now and so were about 150 Euros, four credit cards, my American driver’s license, my health insurance cards and much more.
By the time we got to our AirBnB in the 5th arrondissement, I had received a text from one of my credit card companies: a purchase for $4,000, on the Champs-Elysées, had been made—and, fortunately, had been declined.
Soon, other credit card notifications came in—same or very similar enormous amounts, similarly declined. Except my combination credit card/debit card from my credit union bank. That one, for $3,990, had somehow gone through. (I would ultimately be able to reverse the charges made on the card, but not without considerable hassle.)
I also received a number of emails from the credit card companies, saying they had detected what could be fraudulent activity on their cards and could I confirm that the transactions were legitimate? I responded immediately they were not.
I spent the next hour or so calling the credit companies telling them to cancel the cards. I knew one customer service number to call because my wife still had her card with the same company, but fortuitously a different account. For phone numbers for the other cards, I googled furiously.
Once all the calls were made, all the cards canceled, I walked down the Rue de la Montagne Ste. Genevieve to the police commissariat of the 5th arrondissement, to report the theft. All the policemen with whom I spoke were unfailingly gracious, not at all surprised that another tourist had fallen victim to a pickpocket on the metro and were highly skeptical that my wallet or any stuff within it would ever be found.
“You know, they are rarely recovered, monsieur,” one officer said.
The only good news? One Paris cop complimented me on my French when I explained what had happened.
So, what lessons to be learned from this travel misadventure? Here are some, maybe particularly important when you’re traveling as older.
Before embarking on your trip, purge your wallet. Carry only what is essential. There is, obviously, no need to carry four credit cards.
Make a list of exactly what’s remaining in your wallet. Medical information? What kind of IDs? Put that list on your phone or on paper safely hidden.
Make copies of all essential information you’ll be carrying—driver’s license or ID cards, insurance cards, and so on. Maybe take one copy, leave one copy at home.
Make sure you have, on your phone, in a notebook or with your traveling companion if you’re not traveling alone, the numbers for all your credit cards, as well as what phone numbers to call if they are lost.
Make sure you have fraud alerts enabled on all your credit cards.
If you want or need to carry a lot of cash, split it up: put some in a locked compartment of your suitcase or backpack.
Before entering crowded areas, maybe take extra precautions, like stowing a wallet deep within a zipped-up backpack.
Make sure to contact the local authorities if you are victimized and get a copy of your official report.
And don’t let a very unfortunate incident ruin a trip.