BBC presenter gets money back after being scammed

LovesBach

My daughter is of a deeply suspicious nature, and quick to spot anything underhand. However, even she came close to being scammed - won't bore you with all the details, but after a highly plausible chain of events, she began to read a card number over the phone, and then had a light bulb moment. She cut the call off at once and rang her bank on another phone - her first call back to her bank had clearly been to the scammers - to have it confimred that they knew nothing of the matter. She had a large sum in her account to pay a contractor, and would have lost it.

I was scammed by someone who worked for a reputable firm; when I dealt with an exchange over the phone she said my credit card wasn't working, did I have another one I could use. I did and both credit cards were used fraudulently several times.
My exchange goods did arrive but when I complained to the firm they said no-one of that name worked on their sales team so she gave a false name.

Don’t we all like to think that we would never be taken in by these vile scammers but I have read and heard enough about how they operate, and how clever and convincing they are to know that none of us can afford to be complacent.
The scammers would have to be very clever at what they do, wouldn’t they otherwise nobody would fall for it.

However I must admit I began to lose a bit of sympathy for Peter when I heard that he had agreed to download an app, as this is a very well known ploy, which of course gives the scammer access to the victim’s account.
Banks have repeatedly told us that they would never ask a customer to do that, so that request alone should have brought him to his senses.

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A very important thing to remember is that if you re going to ring your Bank to confirm the authenticity of the call ALWAYS DO SO ON ANOTHER PHONE.

Scammers retain control of the phone they’ve rung on by playing a dialling-tone recording, which they then pretend to answer as your Bank. They then, so say, transfer you to the Department you need.

The dialling tone you hear ISN’T real. Go to an entirely different phone - a mobile for instance if they’ve rung on a landline. If you don’t have another phone, ask your neighbour if you can please borrow theirs.

But NEVER EVER use the same phone until at least some hours later.

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A very good tip Barbadosbelle which I have read before.
All these tips help.

Someone rang me once and asked about my recent bank activity. I refused to answer at which point he said “It’s a very simple question, Mrs G” to which I replied “Yes, and one I’m not going to answer” and put the phone down. Obviously a scammer but not a get sophisticated one.

The police who attended out support group recently recommended never to speak when you answer the telephone just hold and wait. They will then ask you something if you answer yes you have agreed to something and they are covered.
If in doubt just put the phone down, a genuine caller will phone back.
He also recommended never to carry your cards with your mobile, like a lot of people do,
The telephone trick mentioned above it very common indeed, so watch out for that one in particular. Such a sad world that we have to mistrust everyone.

If you think it’s a scam when you are called, apparently you should tell them that, “this is a scam”.

It seems like most ‘businesses’, they have lists to call, and if they realise you are scam aware, your name is deleted and also not sold on to other scammers.

Kate1949

Yes it's confusing. I had one of these calls, a recorded message. I put the phone down and rang my bank. They had always said that they never contact people in this way. The person I spoke to said 'Yes that was us'.

Same here but mine wasn’t a recorded message it was someone asking about unusual activity on my account. I refused to speak to them as I’d heard the bank would never contact you this way. When I finally managed to get through to my bank on the back of my card they said yes it was their fraud department checking up.

My partner had a call from someone purporting to be his bank, asking about activity on his account just as he was going into an appointment & he asked them to call back later, which they did. They were trying to persuade him to move his money into another account as his had been put at risk by fraudsters monitoring his activity. While he was talking I contacted the bank & it was a scam. The bank told us that they would persuade people to transfer money"to protect it" but it would go into the scammers account, usually Revolut, which is a money transfer bank so it would disappear abroad.

Calendargirl

If you think it’s a scam when you are called, apparently you should tell them that, “this is a scam”.

It seems like most ‘businesses’, they have lists to call, and if they realise you are scam aware, your name is deleted and also not sold on to other scammers.

I had a call from someone saying they needed to gve me a refund on my BT account. I replied that as I didn't have a BT account he waas clearly a scammer. He then called me a F***ing B**ch. I was so shocked I said "What did you say?" and he repeated himself very clearly!

As regards using another phone I did this when someone claiming to be the police said they had someone in custody with my bank cards. I didn't even use my mobile for the right reason it was simply that I pay for landline calls while my mobile calls are included in my contract. Very quickly the scammer called again on the landline to ask why I wasn't calling my bank. I Said " I am, on my other phone" and he got very angry and slammed the phone down. He'd wasted a lot of time on me as I was insisting on writing down all his details including his rank and shoulder number etc. I love to waste a scammer's time!