Phome Scam

[Chris Parks]

My wife received a phone call this morning telling her "the bank" (no brand of bank) had overcharged her $4288.00 on purchases. She was urged to ring a phone number that the kind person provided so arrangements could be made to return the money to her. She didn't ring and ten minutes later another call saying that they were waiting for her phone call, again she didn't bite and another phone call. When the third phone call was received she looked at the caller ID and seeing it was from OS let it go through to message bank. No message and no further phone calls so far. I haven't heard of this scam before and have always warned against providing any details on the phone if asked so I guess they wasted a bit of time which is the only satisfaction I get out of the whole thing.

[crowie]

It may be worth forwarding the info onto the telephone ombudsmen or fair trading as I'm sure one of them keeps tabs of this stuff.....

[lesmeyer]

Not sure about your neck of the woods, but here in WA such behaviors can be reported to Consumer Protection. They are pretty good with following up such matters.
Les

[AlexS]

Trouble is, none of them can do anything about calls like this that come from overseas.

[Chris Parks]

If they ring again I will string them along and have a bit of fun. I guess the wrong BSB and phoney account number won't amuse them. the only problem with returning the call is I recall that phone numbers can be set up to make the caller's account to be loaded with huge call fees.

[jimbur]

Did you read about the English bloke who paid for one of the numbers that charge the caller? He only gives the number to such entities as electric, water boards etc. He's now making a profit with junk calls.

[BobL]

If they ring again I will string them along and have a bit of fun. I guess the wrong BSB and phoney account number won't amuse them. the only problem with returning the call is I recall that phone numbers can be set up to make the caller's account to be loaded with huge call fees.

If they call again just say.

"Please wait for one moment while I redirect your call to the Australian Federal Police who are keen to get your details"

[jimbur]

Bob, or this call is being recorded for training and testing voice recognition software.

[Mulgabill]

I recently received a call from "Global Financial Services" Zurich advising me that "your bank (no name given) had over-charge you on your home loan and under recent Bank policy changes a large refund was due and to call 02 xxxx xxxx and speak with Dennis to make arrangements". The funny thing is that I have not had a home loan for many years and when I did it was not with my current Bank. Out of curiousity I rang the 02 number and when I asked for Dennis it I was clearly redirected to OS.
The gullible beware.

[Chris Parks]

Mulgabill, that sounds like the same scammers.

[Mulgabill]

Mulgabill, that sounds like the same scammers.

A curse on them

[rrich]

It was spam but something similar.

I gave them the a phony name and the phone number / address of the Los Angeles FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) office. Then I got a few spam saying that the FBI was after me for various things. So I responded to the spam-er suggesting that with his talents he should be building web pages rather than trying to steal. Never heard another word.

BTW - There is a phone scam going on here. A caller from the "Electric Power Company" calls and says that the electricity is going to be shut off unless you use a credit or debit card to pay a bill. There is no electric company that I'm aware of that would do that. I tell them to go ahead as we've been off the grid for 10 years. It was almost comical as the scam artist just stammered, was obviously confused and just hung up.

[smidsy]

I got one of the Nigerian money laundering emails once, so I replied - funnily enough, the name and address I gave them just happened to be the same as the WA police commissioner.