Spin Control: Medicare scanners may call, but try not to pick up. This columnist learned that the hard way

Federal officials sent out email alerts last week about the prevalence of Medicare scams, warning about fraudsters calling out of the blue and asking if you are on the federal health insurance system for seniors.

Don’t give out personal information, they advised. Medicare won’t call you unless you’ve contacted them first.

In fact, if you don’t recognize the number, don’t even answer the phone.

That last suggestion sounds like good advice. But if you ever had teenagers who were still out of the house when you went to sleep, when the phone near the bed rings at 6 a.m., you automatically answer it. Even if the teenagers are now grown and raising children of their own, you’ll pick up. It’s a learned reflex, like Pavlov’s drooling dog.

Which I did last week, even though part of my brain was telling me it’s probably a scam. Besides, I had to pick it up to make it stop ringing.

When my “Hello?” was greeted with a click, and a pause, and a returning “Hello” that sounded like a recording being played at the bottom of a barrel, the scam was confirmed.

Yep. A Medi-scam. Another Medi-scam.

I hung up before they could ask me if I was over 65 or had Medicare, which wasn’t any of their business. The phone rang again about an hour later, but I didn’t answer. Different number, probably same scam.

Later that day, the next day, the day after and almost every day, calls to the house landline, all hours of the night and day, usually with a different number each time.

I began to wonder if I was a prime target because of the landline. Did scammers target landlines because they have a greater chance of belonging to people who grew up memorizing a phone number that started with two letters, had a boxy device with a dial on the kitchen wall and talked into a receiver with an extra-long cord that knotted if you stretched it too far? In other words, an obvious senior citizen.

I don’t keep a landline out of nostalgia. Cell coverage at the house can be spotty, and after moving to Olympia it was important that editors could reach me late at night when the paper was just minutes from deadline to ask, “What the heck did you mean by this word in your story?”

The landline might be part of it, said Charles Sheldon, who works in the state’s Medicare Patrol Program. But scammers cast a wide net.

“They can get very elaborate, their screening systems,” Sheldon said.

But 6 a.m. seems a bit counterproductive, I suggested. Part of the scam is to ask you for your Medicare Number. While many people can recite their Social Security Number in their sleep after writing it hundreds of times on job applications, bank documents and tax forms, hardly anyone could spit out their nine-character alpha-numeric Medicare Code without three cups of coffee and the card right in front of them.

But that’s not really the point of the 6 a.m. call, Sheldon said.

“With their algorithms, by answering the phone, you’re telling them you’re a ‘live one.’ ”

So they’ll call back.

And back.

And back.

The scam goes something like this: The caller – which may be an automated voice program – says there’s a new feature, sometimes called an “Inflation Relief Package,” for Medicare recipients. That’s a good time to hang up the phone – there is no such package, Sheldon said – although a better tactic would have been not to answer it at all.

If you don’t recognize the number, let it go to voicemail, he said. Scammers don’t leave messages.

If you do answer the phone, the caller may first ask if you are over 65 or ask if you receive Medicare Part A and B. DO NOT SAY “YES,” because any such affirmation may be recorded and used by the scammer to spoof your number.

Don’t say anything. Hang up.

Later in the week – because reporters sometimes do dumb things for stories so readers don’t – I did pick up. When a caller who claimed to be “Olivia” asked if I was on Medicare, I answered, “That’s none of your business.” She asked if I had a Medicare Advantage Plan because she wanted to tell me about a new Medicare Advantage Plan called Infinity Health Clinic. I said Medicare never calls people out of the blue. She hung up.

That’ll teach them, I thought. A few hours later, the phone rang. An automated voice that sounded suspiciously like Olivia but claimed to be Nora asked if I was on Medicare. I said Medicare doesn’t call people out of the blue. Slight click. Nora said she wasn’t from Medicare. She was from Nova Healthcare and had a new Advantage offering. When I said I didn’t need a new advantage plan and I’ve never heard of Nova, she said she probably couldn’t help me today and hung up.

Sheldon said Infinity Health Clinic is a nice generic sounding name, which scammers often use. A little research shows it’s being used in one of the more ubiquitous Medi-scams right now. Nova Healthcare is a real company, but they don’t call people to get them to sign up; scammers are using it to steal personal information.

I don’t know if I’m getting more Medi-scam calls by engaging briefly with the callers than I would have just by answering the 6 a.m. call. I let the phone ring for the ones that come during normal waking hours. For those pre-dawn calls, however, the landline phone is being removed from its cradle and banished to another room where at least the ringing won’t wake me up.

I just hope this will stop at the end of March when the last Medicare Advantage deadline passes.