New scams

[Kayzmum]

Two new scams I learned about recently. First one — my ex-SIL passed away a few days ago. Her husband got a call from the funeral home stating they made a mistake regarding what his final payment should be and he owed more money (my daughter can’t remember the amount) and it needed to be paid right away (the funeral is tomorrow). He was getting ready to give them his CC# and his daughter told him not to, it could be a scam. Sure enough, he called the funeral home directly and they told him it was a scam. He had no outstanding balance due. Isn’t that terrible! This death was unexpected and the family is in shock and devastated.

The second one was yesterday I got an email from a local hospital reminding me to finish my financial assistance application. I never started one so I assume this is a scam.

 

[easysurfer]

I got a scam call from someone with a foreign accent pretending to be Blue Cross to schedule a home visit checkup. He mention my first and last name but I smelled a scam. Plus I'm not interested in some home visit. I hung up. Usually my phone has call blocking on but I was expecting another call that I wanted to answer in person.

 

[erkevin]

everyone should spend a little time each week or each day on Reddit Scams to keep up with the last bamboozlement. https://www.reddit.com/r/Scams/

 

[JoeWras]

Hustlers prey on grieving families. They see the death announcements and go into action. That's what happened here.

A long running hustle is to rob the home of the deceased's family during the wake or funeral. Many people choose a neighbor, family member or trusted friend to house-sit during those times. I wish I were joking about this, I am not. If you are a child of the deceased, your home is also vulnerable.

This is why some people are now not publishing death notices. What a world we live in.

 

[anothercog]

I see so many scam reports at work. So many are crypto scams by people pretending to be our employees on social media. I am amazed that people fall for these scams but they do. A fund manager who manages a $5B is not going to be chatting with you on WhatsApp or Telegram to show you how to trade crypto currency. No common sense. We keep shutting them down but then two more pop up. The only way it will stop is if people stop falling for it.

 

[Walt34]

A few days ago I got a phone call, ostensibly from the college I graduated from, wanting a contribution for something, I forget what it was now. But I'm 74 and haven't seen the place for decades, so I just hung up on them. It's not hard to believe scammers actually did get hold of former student's data, schools (at least formerly) were generally sloppy about data security. Hopefully most have wised up by now.

 

[CardsFan]

A few days ago I got a phone call, ostensibly from the college I graduated from, wanting a contribution for something, I forget what it was now. But I'm 74 and haven't seen the place for decades, so I just hung up on them. It's not hard to believe scammers actually did get hold of former student's data, schools (at least formerly) were generally sloppy about data security. Hopefully most have wised up by now.

That one was likely not a scam. I still get emails from my alma mater looking for money (I am soon to be 69). I used to give. Then I saw what they were now charging for tuition. No more.

 

[anothercog]

Yeah, I get those from my college too but haven't picked up in years. It's pretty much the only call I get from that area code. I stopped giving since I have got one kid in college and two more on the way and none will be attending my alma mater.

 

[erkevin]

When my undergrad call back in the 80s, I pretended I was my brother and told them that I was serving life for murder. Never got a call from them again.

 

[SecondCor521]

I had both of my universities in my will for a while. I mentioned it to them, hoping it would get me out of the awkward annual gifting calls from current students. So they added me to their endowment society membership rolls and occasionally invite me to have hors d'oeuvres with the university president or whatever. Still didn't get me out of the annual phone calls, and I recently noticed an uptick in the solicitations and reminders, which felt a bit vulture-ish.

I've since removed them from my will and will get around to mentioning it to them some time. No hard feelings, just other things I'd rather do with my estate.

 

[EarlyandLate]

I got a scam call from someone with a foreign accent pretending to be Blue Cross to schedule a home visit checkup. He mention my first and last name but I smelled a scam. Plus I'm not interested in some home visit. I hung up. Usually my phone has call blocking on but I was expecting another call that I wanted to answer in person.

This may not have been a scam directed at you. Rather a way to use you to "scam" Uncle Sam. My elderly dad asked me a few years ago about this kind of offer from his medicare advantage plan by United. I googled it and came up with several articles explaining it. Under medicare rules, the companies can only charge you a certain amount for the insurance. However, the amount they get from medicare for covering you is based on your risk pool. They offer these free in home exams with the hope that they will identify some health risk that you have that allows them to classify you in a higher risk pool. Therefore, they get more money from the government to cover you.
After frequent calls from United, my dad relented and agreed to have one. He said that it was a much more thorough physical exam than his own doctor provides. (Focusing on age related limitations like balance, etc) However, what he talked about most was "the nice attractive young nurse that came to his house". He is elderly and a little lonely for female company since my mom died a decade ago. He now does this every year.

 

[fosterscik]

I think I got lucky (doesn't happen often ). When we moved home changing our state of residence we kept our old cell phone numbers. It makes it really easy to detect scam calls which usually originate from our "old" area code. I generally answer calls with our current area code - they are rarely scams. I assume most spam phone/message contacts spoof area codes to match the receiving phone.

 

[MarieIG]

DH got a text from "NYC" stating that there was a balance of $2.50 due from a traffic infraction . . .