Online gift cards scams becoming common
The Scam of the Week focuses on a new way to cheat you when you shop online
In an age where it's so easy to have our personal information compromised, we have to be cautious when shopping online.
Dreama Jensen of the Better Business Bureau of Northern Indiana says for the most part, we're doing a better job keeping an eye out these days. For that reason, scammers have developed a new technique to rob you when you shop online.
Holiday shoppers are now leery of using prepaid debit cards or wire transfers to shop online. Scammers will often ask for those methods of payment because they're untraceable.
The new method being reported to the BBB is a website that looks legitimate and offers high-ticket items like TVs or phones at deeply discounted prices. The customer will be asked to use a gift card from a company like Amazon.com for payment. Many scammers will even claim that using this method will enable the person to avoid paying sales tax.
The websites will likely even offer a customer review section, filled with positive feedback about the experiences people have had doing business with the company, or the ease of shopping. These reviews are fake.
More likely than not, as soon as you give them the information for that gift card, the operator of the website will be impossible to contact and the item you ordered will never arrive.
The BBB recommends that anyone who encourages you to pay for online purchases in this way is likely a scam artist, and you are encouraged to NOT shop with them and inform the BBB about the site.
As always, you can reach out to the BBB of Northern Indiana with questions or concerns. Call them locally at 675-9351, or dial 800-552-4631. You can also visit them online at BBB.org.
Tommie Lee is the morning news anchor on the Truth Radio Early Edition. Dreama Jensen’s Scam of the Week is heard Thursday mornings at 6:45 A.M. and 8:45 A.M.
