Holiday Criminals

Porch Robbers

Bad guys are following delivery trucks and stealing packages from front porches.

If you are expecting a particularly valuable package you may want to track it online and try to be home when the package arrives.

Charity Scams

Fake charities and charities with extremely high administrative costs are after your money this time of year.

Most of the charities have impressive sounding names and often focus on veterans, the hungry, the disabled and cute puppies.

Never give a debit or credit card number over the phone, and do not donate unless the charity will send you something in writing that explains their work, and you first check out the charity on-line.

Purse Snatchers, Pick Pockets and the Mall

Shop during the day, shop during off hours when you can park close, and be aware of those around you.

Do not flash cash, an expensive smart phone or anything that makes you a target. Best to not shop alone.

Phony and Phonier

What is making the news in terms of financial abuse of seniors citizens?

Phony lottery winning schemes:

Congratulations, you have won $250,000 in the Australian National Lottery!

Wire $500 for required taxes and fees and we will release you prize!

People do fall for this, even though they never entered the Australian lottery.

Phony IRS calls:

The IRS will never make an initial contact via telephone, you will receive written notice. Never give anyone claiming to be an IRS agent your credit or debit card information, or any other information.


NEVER wire money or give anyone your credit card number unless you are absolutely certain the deal is legitimate.



 

Seasonal Shopping Tips

This is the biggest shopping day of the year! So be careful. Some tips:

If you shop on-line use sites you know and trust.

Be careful of surfing into unknown sites via pop-up ads.

Be careful of pop-up ads in general, unless you are taken to a known site.

Be very careful with credit and debit card numbers. Remember your credit card has better fraud protection.

A Paypal account ads another level of security. A personal account is free and easy to set up.   www.paypal.com  

Read terms and conditions carefully before purchase.

Read shipping information carefully. Read insurance-in-transit information if considering a large purchase.

Much of this advice also applies for in-store shopping. Be certain of all key terms of the transaction (returns, warranties, etc.). On smaller purchases a warranty may be a bad gamble, don't get bulldozed by the salesman.

Enjoy your shopping!

Work from Home?

"I make $7000 a week working on the Internet! So can you! It is easy."

No, not really.

When you click the link either some website will ask you for personal information or you will be the recipient of a trojan or virus, usually without your knowledge.

There is no Internet free lunch.

Note: emails from strange places with “click this link” are best deleted immediately, and requests to confirm your password are usually hacker traps.

Annuity Sleaze

There are some good annuity products.

There are a lot of mediocre annuity products.

There are a lot of really bad annuity products.

There are a lot of salesmen who make big money when they sell you the bad annuity products.

There are a lot of salesmen who prey on senior citizens.

A committee of the U.S. Senate is taking on the top 15 annuity companies. Not surprisingly, many of the companies have not been very cooperative.

Not surprisingly, some of the companies have admitted lavish compensation and gift packages for salesmen who push high-priced, low value products. Some of the companies use third party pass-thru operations to disguise what appear to be payoffs. 

Of course, the financial companies swear the buyers are getting good value.

Annuity sales is one of the sleaziest categories in the financial world.  Be very careful.

Funeral pre-need Contracts

At least monthly we see a news article about a funeral home operator convicted of stealing pre-need funeral money from customers.

As a percentage of funeral homes it is very tiny (at least the ones who are caught is very tiny) but the damage to the impacted seniors is very great.

When you do pre-need payments to a funeral home find out exactly how the money will be managed and exactly who will hold the funds. Get receipts. If the answers are not satisfactory do not give up the money.

On a related note…..

Smith and Jones Funeral Home may be have been in your community for decades, and may have been family owned for decades, but now may be owned by a large corporation you have never heard of, and the service you expect may not be the same. Just so you know.

PS: The State of Ohio is currently in the middle of a mess on this issue, including a battle among the members of the state board regulating funeral directors.

 

The Grandparent Scam

Imagine receiving this phone call…….

“Mr. Smith, the is Constable McGarrett from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Your grandson Jacob was picked up trying to return to the U.S. with some marijuana in his pocket. His classmates from Grand Castle University are waiting on the other side of the border hoping he gets released.”

How does a scammer know you have a grandson Jacob who attends Grand Castle University? Probably Facebook. Or the newspaper announcement of your anniversary party. 

“Mr. Smith, Jacob cannot contact his parents. We would prefer not to hold him for prosecution, this is small stuff,  but to let him go we need a bond of $2500.  Jacob is hoping you can Western Union the money so he can go back to school. We can give you a routing number.”

If you ask to speak with your grandchild that will of course be impossible.

Could this scam really work? Almost every day.

A scammer can make a couple hundred of these calls a day. Most people slam the phone down, but if one or two a day bite on this scam, it is a $5000 profit.

Never send money anywhere to anyone without confirming the details. Do not let someone panic you.

The odds of recovering your money? 0%