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Are You Being Scammed?
by LaVonne Boruk
A pleasant male voice came over the phone, "Do you need help paying your power bills?"
Not in the mood for talking I hung up the phone without a word, then went on about my business as usual forgetting all about the call. Until that is, a couple weeks later when the phone rang again and without preliminary that same soothing male voice asked, "Do you need help paying your power bills?"
Now who in the world cares whether I'm able to pay my power bill? Most people are too concerned with paying their own bills and wouldn't give mine a thought. And they certainly wouldn't want to take on an extra power bill just for the fun of it. And whose business is it but mine whether my power bill gets paid?
Our newspaper has often carried articles asking the same question that came to me from the caller. There is help available it seems, for those needing it in times of extreme weather conditions. But usually that has been in the wintertime and it is more concerned with poor people who are not always able to pay their heating bills. Concerned that some people may freeze to death if the utility company cuts off their power or gas, there is a program in place in our community for such emergencies. Knowing that needy families must apply for this consideration, and knowing also that my family does not qualify, I began to realize that something is wrong with this call.
In much of the country it has been a long hot, dry summer with temperatures well over a hundred degrees Fahrenheit. In such weather people need to run their air conditioners. At times air conditioners can run up the utility bill as much or more than the heating bill. People can and do die from excessive heat, too; so it is not unreasonable that help would be available to pay air conditioning bills during such heat waves. It was only the solicitation that raised questions in my mind. There had been nothing in the paper in recent days about such help.
Why were we called? Does the power company solicit by telephone to help the needy? I doubted it. Besides, they have our records of more than thirty years. All they'd need to do is call it up on their computer and they'd know whether we qualified for help. The phone call would be unnecessary and a waste of valuable manhours. Our power company is a modern one that has no need to rely on such tactics.
Then I remembered that our newspaper had recently carried an article warning us about scammers in our neighborhood. It was a different scam, but remembering it put me on notice that this is probably a scam as well. Someone looking to get information they could use for whatever their purpose. What should I do? Should I forget about it and maybe let the scammer continue? That idea didn't sit well with me, so I called the power company to see if the call was legitimate. It was not. It did not originate with the power company. The power company does not solicit their customers.
So what were these calls about? I can only guess. They may have been crank calls, someone trying to have a little fun. But I doubt that. More likely they were hoping to get a credit card number, or a social security card number, or just find out if anyone was home, or whatever information they might find that they could use to their own advantage.
Generally such telephone calls will catch the recipient off guard. That is what the scammer counts on. So get in the habit of clearing your mind of other things before answering that uninvited call so that you don't inadvertently give the caller the information he/she hopes to trick you into giving out. Don't be fooled by that pleasant, soothing voice. It's designed to keep you off guard.
To protect ourselves we should all make it a habit never to give out any personal information to any caller. Don't even verify the telephone number. I think of such calls as an intrusion on my privacy and I never talk to the caller. Never. Not even a pleasant good day, how are you? I don't care whether their day is pleasant. And my asking isn't going to make it so. Besides, my day will be much more pleasant without these calls, so I do not offer anything that could be construed as encouragement.
©2000 LaVonne Boruk
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