Scams

There are numerous scams created everyday, all designed to trick you into handing over money or personal details.

Every year around 3 million UK consumers lose a total of £3.5 billion to scams. Here are some of the things you should look out for;

 

Poor spelling or grammar in emails

Scammers will often put misspellings in their email in an effort to avoid triggering spam filters for common keywords in their messages, for example “money” or “gambling”. This way they can maximize the number of people their messages reach by avoiding spam filters.

 

Claiming to be someone they’re not

A common scam is when you receive a call from someone claiming to be from a company such as “Microsoft”. In this situation, the caller may claim there’s an issue with your computer and will ask you to go to a website and download some virus protection software.

Companies like Microsoft would not contact you in this way and if you receive a call similar to this hang up. If you have an issue, call the company directly.

Seek out reviews and references for companies that you haven’t used before, either via the internet or when looking for a trader you can use Suffolk Trusted Trader.

Suffolk Trusted Trader is a directory of local tradesmen who have been checked by Suffolk County Council Trading Standards and made a commitment to treat their customers fairly.

Consumers give feedback on the traders they have used and details of the traders can be found at www.suffolktrustedtrader.com

 

Inheritance scams

Many scams today are sent via email, including one wherein individuals claim to be heirs to a fortune that they cannot access. Most commonly, they will request your bank information so that they can wire you some money – never give out any financial or personal information from an unsolicited email.

 

Low, low prices

You may see branded goods for sale with prices that are much lower than the normal market price. In some cases this may be a scam to get you to hand over your credit/debit card details or you may receive counterfeit versions of the goods.

Counterfeit goods are often of poor quality and can be dangerous. Before buying from a company, you should check other consumers’ reviews to see what their experiences have been, In some cases consumers have been caught out by counterfeit websites, which look like the genuine retailer.

You can use the website Brand-i to avoid this issue, as it list the genuine websites for branded goods.

 

Prize Draw

You may receive an email, letter or telephone call that informs you, you’ve won a prize. But for you to claim the prize you either have to pay a fee or you need to order something from a catalogue.

However, in the small print it states that you are actually entering a prize draw. If you receive something similar to this, you need to think if you have entered any prize draws?

And if it is asking for you to pay any money? If so this is probably a scam and should be ignored.