New scams join old in 2015
Everything old is new again, at least as far as scams go.
The most common scam targeting people in the area in 2015 was the IRS scam, in which callers claim to be IRS agents, aggressively demanding money.
But as 2015 came to a close, the Spokane Better Business Bureau warned of a new scam targeting people who own timeshares in Mexico.
Several people have reported being contacted by a company called All Business Consultant Services based in Dalton Gardens, Idaho. The people are told that someone is interested in paying a large amount of cash for their timeshare, but the owner must pay thousands of dollars in fees up front to satisfy Mexican taxes.
It appears that someone purchased the ABCS business name in 2015 to make the scam seem legitimate, said BBB director of communications Chelsea Maguire. The name had previously been owned by a corporation that formed in 2012.
“It really looks like a scam, but they’ve gone through a lot of steps to look like a legitimate business,” Maguire said.
One woman who claimed to have lost $4,100 to the scam said she was transferred to an escrow agent with Epic National Title and Settlement Services in Lakewood, Colorado, to complete the transaction. That company has an F rating with the Colorado BBB because it is not licensed.
Maguire said she just heard from another woman who wired $4,500 to pay the Mexican taxes. In both cases the supposed buyer was not heard from after the money was sent.
It appears the scammers have a list of people who own timeshares in Mexico, Maguire said. “We’re unsure how they got that information,” she said.
Money lost in a scam is often gone for good. “If they have wired money and the money has been picked up by the recipient, there’s likely no way to get that money back,” she said.
“It’s almost exclusively a phone scam and unfortunately it uses very aggressive tactics,” she said of the supposed IRS calls.
The caller often threatens to have the person arrested if they don’t pay their supposed back taxes. One woman was told she would lose custody of her children if she didn’t comply, Maguire said.
The real IRS will contact people by mail if taxes are owed, Maguire said. Agents never make calls.
The Microsoft scam also was popular in 2015 and shows no sign of going away. The caller claims to be with Microsoft technical support and tells the person that their computer has a virus. The caller offers to get rid of it for a fee or instruct the victim to go through certain steps on their computer to give the caller remote access to the device.
“Then they can take over the computer,” she said. “It’s been on the top of our list for a couple years now.”
The Washington attorney general’s office recently filed a lawsuit against iYogi for deceptive business practices. Company representatives would call residents and use high-pressure tactics to convince people to install unnecessary “diagnostic” software and then sell expensive tech support service packages.
The company would claim to represent Microsoft, Apple and HP, the attorney general’s office said. It also would try to sell anti-virus software and an upgrade to Windows 10, which Microsoft offers for free.
The Spokane Police Department said in December that the sweepstakes scam is making the rounds again. People are told they have won a sweepstakes but have to pay fees and taxes in advance.
While it may not seem important to report a scam or attempted scam, Maguire said the information is necessary.
“Often the scammers are not located in the United States,” she said. “It’s difficult to even have jurisdiction to go after them. But reporting the information does help. We need to know how big the problem is, so we can go after it.”
If there’s a sudden increase in a type of scam, law enforcement and the Better Business Bureau can get the word out to the public to warn others.
Maguire urges people to be cautious in anything dealing with money. People should never give out personal or financial information in a phone call they did not initiate.
“Ask questions and confirm before handing over money,” she said. “Any legitimate business will give you time to do your research.”