And they have called the targeting of pensioners with intimidating and fraudulent letters the ‘equivalent of teenagers being cyber-bullied’.
As part of a crackdown the Consumer Council has asked Islanders to dispose of suspicious mail they receive in several new designated public bins, so the States police can investigate the sources of the letters.
The council has also joined forces with the Citizens Advice Bureau, Jersey Post, the Parish of St Helier, Trading Standards, Liberty Bus and G4S to take action to reduce the circulation of nuisance letters.
Anne King, executive officer at the Jersey Consumer Council, said that scammers seemed to be mainly targeting the elderly and vulnerable.
‘It is concerning because the letters are often official-looking and they can play on people’s emotions or morals,’ she said. ‘They can tempt people with prizes, and some are even threatening. Some, for example, are from fake psychics threatening bad luck.
‘It’s a particular problem for older people, who find it more difficult to ignore or throw away official-looking documents, especially if they live on their own. ‘It’s a generational thing and they don’t know how to cope. Some of them can be receiving as many as eight, nine or ten letters a day.’
Mrs King admits the scale of the problem is unknown but thinks that the scam letter bins can help bring the problem under control
‘This could just be the tip of the iceberg. People can be quite reluctant to come forward if they are a victim and we don’t know the extent of the problem,’ she said. ‘But it’s good to have a team now to specifically deal with this, and we can beat this if we work together.’
The Jersey Consumer Council has called for Islanders not to respond to scam letters in ‘any way, shape or form’ and to contact the police on 612612 if they are being targeted.
They have also encouraged victims to come forward to friends and relatives and post any suspect letters into the scam bins at the Citizens Advice Bureau at St Paul’s Centre in New Street, Trading Standards in the Central Market, Liberty Bus Station, Broad Street Post Office, the Town Hall and Postal Headquarters at Rue des Prés.
ISLANDERS lost hundreds of thousands of pounds in one weekend last September after a sophisticated phone scam targeted Jersey households.
The States police said that as many as five people or couples fell victim to thescam, with hundreds of thousands of pounds stolen in total.
One Islander spoke of how her parents’ bank account was drained of thousands of pounds of life savings as a result of the ‘highly convincing’ con.
St Saviour resident Shona Ringsdore said her elderly parents had lost ‘thousands’ and one of their accounts was left with just ‘pennies’ in it after a fraudster contacted her father, who is in his 80s, on Friday telling him his account had been compromised.
‘They said they were from NatWest’s fraud squad and asked if he had been trying to buy a £900 watch,’ she said.
‘This chap was so plausible. My dad was obviously shaken up after hearing his account had been compromised and he told him to calm down and breathe and then asked if he was okay.’
Mrs Ringsdore said her parents had been lucky because not all of their life savings had been taken but she feared others may not have been so fortunate.
And now she is questioning the bank’s role in the scam, asking why they let her parents move such a large quantity of cash without question.
‘My sheer anger is with the bank for not even querying as to why he was moving such a large amount of money. The bank have told them they have not got a leg to stand on as they moved the money themselves.
‘These fraudsters are very good at what they do. They told them to move the money using a quick payment which means the money can’t be stopped.
‘My parents are lucky because they have not lost everything but it has shocked them terribly. My father feels foolish.’
Mrs Ringsdore believes the con artists behind the scam are targeting the elderly and she added that she was shocked to hear they were operating through an English bank account.
‘I don’t understand how these people in the UK get through the rigmarole of setting up an account,’ she said.
The scammers typically ring up and tell the householder that their bank card has been compromised and that they need to ring the telephone number on the back of their card.
However, they do not hang up and when the person rings the bank they patch themselves through and pretend to be from the fraud office.
They instruct the cardholder to move their money into a holding account to protect it but they are actually taking the money instead.
In some cases Islanders have spent more than an hour on the phone to the scammers. The police advised Islanders to never give details to cold callers and if in doubt to hang up and attend the bank in person.
