Scammers are a tricky bunch.
I thought I was fairly astute when it comes to detecting a scammer, but that confidence was demolished very quickly this week. I was taken in by an impersonation scammer.
I received a call from “Visa” credit cards with an automated voice telling me that they had noticed a couple of strange transactions. Apparently, I had purchased an Amazon Card for $1000, and an Apple gift card for $800. Both transactions were considered out of the ordinary for me and they were ringing to see whether I had made such purchases; if not, they would cancel the transactions.
I denied making such purchases and agreed that they be cancelled, which brought up a live person who wanted some more details, such as my surname and the name of my bank. Then they offered that the supposed purchases had been made in California using an iPhone, which sounded even more convincing. I was told that similar transactions last month had been noticed and automatically cancelled, which was encouraging, but I wondered why I had not been informed. I again requested that the transactions be cancelled.
The “representative’ confirmed the cancellation and advised that I would be hearing from the fraud department of my bank.
This seemed to be very good service on the part of the credit card company, and almost too good to be true, but being a bit of a sceptic, I decided to call the fraud department of the bank myself.
I explained the situation and the first advice i was given was that the credit card company will never call you about fraudulent transactions; such advice will always be from the bank. On checking they advised that the supposed transactions had not occurred, but that the caller had obviously been gathering information. If I received any calls in future purporting to be from the credit card company I should just hang up.
We agreed that I should immediately cancel that credit card and get a replacement. It is an inconvenience, but better to be safe than sorry.
So now I am awaiting a new card, and naturally feeling less than forgiving about these impersonators. As they said on the old TV programme Hill Street Blues, “Be careful out there.”
~ Mick Calder, Office Support Volunteer