Fourth of July: A day for family, barbecues, parades, fireworks and proudly waving the American flag.
All other days: Time to be on the lookout for red flags warning us that we’re about to be spammed, scammed or slammed.
Although the list of scams is infinite, many fall into a few common general categories: grants, advanced-fee loans, lotteries and sweepstakes, reshipping, work-at-home offers, mystery/secret shopping opportunities and phone solicitations. Even that good old standby the Nigerian letter continues to reinvent itself time after time.
Scammers find you via the Internet, U.S. Postal Service, telephone and signs nailed to utility poles. But you don’t have to become a victim if you practice common-sense and, in some instances, self-control.
To get you started, your BBB offers the following red flags that will help you stay scam-free:
- You’re asked to pay an upfront fee, whether it’s for information on a work-at-home job, scholarships or loans. Not only is this a scam, in some instances, such as for loans, it’s illegal. Also, these scam artists make it near to impossible to get a refund and often are never heard from again.
- You’re asked to send money via a wire service. This is a great way for scam artists to hide their identities and locations. If you wire funds, you might as well kiss that money goodbye. If you do hear back from the scam artist, it’ll be with a request to wire additional money.
- You’re overpaid for goods or services by an out-of-state customer and asked to refund the difference via a wire service. Most likely you’ll be out the item you’ve already shipped because it was charged to a stolen credit card plus the “refund.”
- You’re a winner! To receive your windfall, you’re instructed to deposit the check for partial winnings, then send in a fee to get the remainder of the winnings. Not so fast. The scam artist is betting that you’re anxious to receive your sweepstakes check and won’t wait to make sure the phony check he sent clears your bank. If you write a check, the money comes out of your funds and you’ll never see it again.
- You receive an e-mail or letter that’s filled with enough spelling and grammatical errors to make you cringe. Now you might be tempted to take Mrs. Abdulla up on her offer to take millions off her hands that was left to her by her poor, departed husband, but all she really wants is your bank account number and whatever money is tucked away there.
- You get an e-mail warning that you must verify financial and credit card numbers or your account will be closed. Take a good look. Do you really have an account at that institution? Or business? Probably not. If you question it, call the business using a number you have in your files.
If it’s too good to be true, it probably is. Yep, it really is that easy.
Don’t go a day without your BBB. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn. For more consumer information visit wynco.bbb.org/consumers or to check out the BBBlog, visit wynco.bbb.org/blog or call 970-484-1348 or 800-564-0371.