It’s the penultimate day of our fraud awareness campaign and today we’re delving into…
Courier fraud
In these cases, fraudsters often target elderly and vulnerable people and call them over the phone purporting to be from the police or the bank. Once these con artists have engaged a victim, they may make up a story claiming to need help with an investigation into a money scam at the victim’s bank or perhaps spin a line that their account has been hacked and they need further details to protect their assets. They may ask the victim to disclose their card details and pin number or withdraw money from their account ready for them to collect. Recent reports of courier scams in our area show the fraudsters are getting even more sophisticated and providing convincing fake police identity badges at the door.
Prevention:
- Remember, we – the police – will never call you up to request or collect bank details, cards or cash
- If you receive a call of this nature, pause and think. End the call and process the information. Call us on 101 – preferably from a different device to the one the call came in on – and we will be able to verify if the person you spoke to was a genuine officer
- Call your bank immediately if you think you have been scammed so they can freeze your account
For more advice about all kinds of fraud, visit our website
