Big County cons spark scam alert

Jan 27 2009 by Jenny Wood, Perthshire Advertiser Tuesday

Big County cons spark scam alert

AN APPEAL has gone out for the people of Perth and Kinross to help in the fight against scammers after locals were swindled out of tens of thousands of pounds.

One victim even faces losing his home as a result of a life-changing and expensive con.

The costly catalogue of scams include a 55-year-old Big County man who fell foul of fraudsters and lost nearly £30,000 when he was duped by a Costa Rican-based lottery sting. Criminal con merchants also preyed on a woman in her 90s who was deceived into sending around £4000 to bogus clairvoyants.

And heartless crooks systematically took money from an 80-year-old man suffering the early stages of dementia. The callous advertising companies even went as far as sending couriers to collect cheques from the vulnerable man.

Councillor Elspeth Maclachlan, community safety vice-convener, warned those cases are likely to be just the tip of the iceberg.

“The council’s trading standards team has seen a significant rise in the number of people within Perth and Kinross who have been duped by scams which have cost the victims significant sums of money and in one case will probably cost the victim his home.”

She continued: “The officers dealing with local victims, who have lost sums of money ranging from £2,000 to £40,000, are certain they are only seeing the tip of the iceberg as many of the elderly victims either don’t have the capacity to realise they are being conned or are too ashamed to admit it.”

It is estimated con merchants fleece UK citizens out of £3.5billion a year but just five per cent of victims speak out.

So in a bid to beat the scammers, the Office of Fair Trading and local authority trading standards services want to hear of as many cons as possible next month.

February will be ‘Scams Awareness Month’ and members of the public are asked to collect any potential scam mailings they have recently received and drop them into designated ‘Scamnesty’ bins placed in public buildings.

Across the Big County bins will be situated in each council area office, at sheltered housing complexes, at Pullar House in Perth and in participating post offices.

On February 6, awareness seminars will be held at Perth’s A.K. Bell Library to expose the scammers’ heartless techniques and provide advice and guidance on what to look out for and what to do if you find a relative is a victim.

Councillor Maclachlan explained: “Every year an estimated three million people fall victim to mass-marketed scams such as bogus lotteries, deceptive prize draws, fake psychics, get-rich-quick schemes and miracle health cures.

“Many of these scams are sent through the post, as well as by email or over the phone, and mainly target the elderly and vulnerable,” she warned.

To find out the location of the Scamnesty bins, book a place at one of the seminars or discuss in confidence a scam, call the council’s trading standards service on 01738 476476.