OT: Fraudulent call from IRS

Stan in Oly, WA

Well-known Member
My wife and I were awakened by a phone call at 5:30 this morning. It was a recorded message claiming to be IRS (not "THE IRS", just "IRS"). It said that this was the final attempt to contact us to tell us that they were filing lawsuit against us (again, not "A lawsuit", just "lawsuit"). Of course I didn't catch the non-native English speaker clues until I played the message back later. The woman spoke without a detectable accent, except for leaving out those articles. (As a matter of possible interest, Russian and related Slavic languages don't have articles.)

I responded with exactly the mindset that the caller hoped for---I started thinking about what it could be about, and how I would go about explaining that it had to be a mistake. Then I started calculating whether it would be too early to call the 202 area code number that the message had left. My wife however, sick and groggy from cold medicine though she was, was more clearheaded. She said, "You know that's a scam, don't you?" I did as soon as she said it.

When I Googled "IRS scam", there was information about the exact type of call we had received. There was a number to call to report it to the Treasury Inspector General's office. When I called that, I was told in a message that if I hadn't lost money or given out personal information, there wasn't even much point reporting it (that's not exactly what the message said, but that's what it meant, I think).

Wouldn't you just like to hunt these people down and beat the hell out of them?

Stan
 
The other give away is they were filing a lawsuit...

The real IRS does not need to file lawsuits. They just garnish your wages and intercept any tax refunds.

Also, obviously the IRS never calls it is all done through the mail.
 
Hello Stan In Oly,WA

Beat them up for sure. But then we would be the bad people. I get one caller now that must have hundreds of number to choose from. Consumer Services. It ends like this: have a nice day REALLY!!! I now just hang up no later then the second ring, my turn to do it. Stopped a few........


Guido.
 
Caller ID!!!

If we don't recognize the number or name, we don't answer it. Do we miss any important calls with that strategy? Some folks say yes. I say no. Feel free to call it blissful ignorance, but it works quite well for us. Sometimes I answer a call that I mistakenly thought I recognized, but it doesn't take me long to fix it, ha. I've been studying to be a hermit for a long time.
 
Hi Guido;

By hundreds of numbers to choose from, do you mean hundreds of numbers they can be calling from, so that you won't recognize the number? Are you the one who says, "have a nice day REALLY!" to them? How do you know now to hang up on the second ring? Sorry, I'm not quite following.

Wanting to beat someone up for swindling people is just a feeling, nothing I'd ever do even if I got the chance. And getting the chance is probably less likely than the chance that I'll ever become Pope.

Stan
 
On our home phone we hear the message a caller leaves while they are leaving it. That's what we heard this morning. We don't have caller ID on that line, so I never answer the phone.

Stan
 
I've heard of scams like that and if you call back the phone fees are extremely high and charged to your #,I guess they can make money from scamming people that way.
 
Hello Stan in Oly,WA,

Yes. They "CONSUNERS SERVICE"S are using many numbers, but the message is the same. THEY end the message: Have a nice day! Hard to chase them that way. I have caller ID, every time it comes up as consumer services or no name available or a bunch of zeros I just hang up. Just hanging up makes me feel better. I guess you know the do not call list is a joke!

Guido.
 
I've heard of that too, but I think this wasn't that. Those scams often ask you to call back to a number that has an area code that begins with 8, which makes many people believe it's a toll free number. Sometimes you don't find out you're actually calling Latvia, or somewhere like that, until you get your phone bill.

202, the area code of the number I was told to call, is Washington D.C.---to increase the apparent authenticity, I suppose. My guess is that this scam depends on people being frightened and confused enough to believe they're really calling the IRS, and if it's the IRS, then it's all right to give them all kinds of personal identification and financial information. I also think that people my age, 68, are prime targets; although whether they knew my age or it was just a coincidence is something I'll never know. People my age are prime potential victims for two reasons that I can think of; this is the age at which the rate of cognitive impairment begins going up sharply, and people my age often have a respect for authority that many younger people never developed. If they believe they are really dealing with the IRS, they can probably be persuaded to give up quite a bit of information.

Stan
 
Somewhere along the line, there needs to be some sort of regulation to prevent scam callers from displaying "inaccurate" numbers on caller ID. The scammers are making caller ID next to useless.

BTW, regarding whether or not to answer a number you do not recognize...
Think about one of your loved ones that may have been (choose one) injured/killed/stranded/arrested in some sort of incident. Car accident, mugging, illness, breakdown, or some other sort of mishap. Suppose that in the occurrence of this "event," this loved one had to use a borrowed phone/pay phone/hospital or police station phone. And, you don't answer because you don't recognize the number.

>>>>>SHAME ON YOU!!!!!<<<<<<<<

You might have been able to help out your stranded daughter or son or aunt or uncle or parent....or this might be the last time you ever have to speak to that person.

Again...... >>>>>SHAME ON YOU!!!!!<<<<<<<

I ALWAYS answer the phone when it rings. There is no other way to know whether a call is important or not without answering. Granted, there are a lot of nuisance calls these days, but even that one in a hundred that might be important I WILL ANSWER. If it is a nuisance call, I simply tell the caller to take me off their calling list. Sure it gets irritating, but if any of my loved ones needed help, and I did not answer because I did not recognize the number, I would NEVER forgive myself.
 
I answer the phone and mess with their mind; been doing that for years - somehow word must have gotten around as we get very few scam calls now.
 
Jim, the chances of someone being able to call me but not able to speak strikes me as so remote that I'm not going to let it worry me. How would I know who it was, anyway? Sure, you can make up a scenario in which a loved one has suffered a terrible injury to their mouth, and decides to call me instead of calling 911, and they're going to tap out a message hoping I know Morse code, but come on, we've got to live in the real world at least part of the time.

I haven't got caller ID on my landline, but I've got voice mail. I don't answer that phone because I can hear the message the caller leaves. If it's someone I want to talk to, I pick up the receiver and talk. If it's someone I don't want to talk to, or if they don't begin to leave a message, I don't pick up.

Are you proud of yourself for saying "Shame on you" to me when you apparently misunderstood what I was saying? Or are you one of those who is never wrong?

Stan
 
I have a neighbour who answers all unknown numbers/1 800 numbers with a fake chinese accent, stopped in for coffee there the other evening, we're sitting chatting, phone goes, 1 800 something, so he answers "harrow, mings fine sweet and sour chicken balls", the Chinese girl on the other end of the phone line tries to sell him some weight loss stuff, while we are rolling around on the floor laughing (thank god for speaker phones), somehow i doupt they will be calling him back...
 
I got a call from myself this morning but I guess I hung up before I could answer, which I would ot of any way when I saw my own name and number on the caller ID. I wonder how many others I called and irritated. How do they do that.
 
Stan, my rant complete with the shame on you was actually directed at another that stated that he never answers unless he knows the number or who is calling. My comment was more intended to be directed to another poster that made that comment.
FYI, I have on several occasions had calls from numbers that I did not recognize. One turned out to be from my brother to tell me that mother was in the hospital, and that I needed to come and see her. Another was from another brother to tell me that Dad had been admitted to the hospital, and was not expected to live to the weekend. Yet another was from my sister at a pay phone asking for directions to my house since she was in the area and wanted to visit.

For the record, no, I am not one that thinks that I am always right. I am always open to correction and always willing to learn something new. I just get a bit hot under the collar when people make comments like another made. Whatever happened to picking up the phone and saying "hello?" And if the person on the other end is not somebody you want to talk to, politely asking them not to call back? Just like the old days when we all had black Bakelite desk phones with a dial in the middle of it instead of hiding behind a bunch of electronics while the caller tries over and over to finally get an answer.
And, I don't know where the bit about being "proud" came from. To me, this was not an issue of pride. Just something I feel strongly about.
Then there was the time that I was unable to reach a close friend on the phone. Seems he lost his phone and got a replacement. All of his contact numbers were lost. He did not recognize my number. Finally went to his house and knocked on the door. I asked him why he didn't answer the phone. He told me he did not know the number, so he did not answer. I left him a voice mail, and he deleted that without hearing it because he did not know the number. I gave him the same rant. He answers EVERY call now. Guess he agreed with my reasoning.

Sorry for being so long winded, and I hope there are no hard feelings.
 

Kind stepped in the poop here. You need to go take a time out till you can learn to play with others.

What if he answered the phone and it set off a bomb? or started up a volcano? Or caused a 100 year drought and everyone starved to death including you... He may have just saved the world, and your life by not answering the phone. I think you owe him at least a "thank you" for saving your life. Now.. go play nice with the other children and behave!
 
Absolutely no hard feelings, Jim. In fact, after posting my response to you, I began to feel that I'd been kind of a jerk about it. Of course, I'm kind of a jerk, or a smart a$$ in what I post about 5% to 10% of the time (by my estimate).

Probably the main reason I wait for the caller to start to leave a message before I pick up is that I'm still handicapped with old-fashioned manners which makes it hard for me to cut somebody off when they launch into their sales pitch. I always seem to let people selling something or begging for a contribution waste too much of my time and theirs before I can break in and say no thanks. Or else it's a pitch for a good cause, but one I don't normally contribute to, and they guilt me into making a donation of $10 or $20. I consider those to be expensive lessons in how to not answer the phone.

Stan
 
Rollie, it's suprising how in this day and age of cell phones, most people anymore just rely on their "contact list" and don't ever bother to memorize phone numbers.

If someone loses or destroys their cell phone to the point where the old numbers can't be transferred to the new one, then they have no way of knowing what the numbers were.

I can remember a handful of numbers without checking my contact list, but those are all ones I used to call regularly before I had a cell phone...and some of 'em aren't even good numbers anymore.
 
I've taken to answering unfamiliar numbers on my phone as "Hancock County District Attorney, fraud investigation division", the folks with the 202 number hang up on that one.
 
Google the phone number they called you with. That scam has been going on for awhile.
 
Hello Stan in Oly,WA,

The evening news said that scam has cost $14.000.000 so far!

Guido.
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Welll Jim - if it's my chain you're trying to rattle, you're wasting your time. I'll answer my phone when and if I want to, with no regard whatsoever to your opinion of what is or is not shameful. My loved ones, and the people that know me well, know that we'll answer on an immediate second call from an unknown number. No need to apologize for being long winded either, unless you offended someone else, that is, and no - there are no hard feelings - just a different view of telephone usage.
 
(quoted from post at 13:00:16 01/22/15) Hi Guido;

By hundreds of numbers to choose from, do you mean hundreds of numbers they can be calling from, so that you won't recognize the number? Are you the one who says, "have a nice day REALLY!" to them? How do you know now to hang up on the second ring? Sorry, I'm not quite following.

Wanting to beat someone up for swindling people is just a feeling, nothing I'd ever do even if I got the chance. And getting the chance is probably less likely than the chance that I'll ever become Pope.

Stan

I have Dave2's email if you want it. He would go anywhere to beat someone up for you.
 
Yeah but just yesterday an elderly woman was scammed out of $1400 in St Louis after getting one of those calls saying that her grandson was in an accident in a foreign country, and she wired the money to the account.

money gone, police are trying to get FBI to look in to it.

if she had answering machine she could follow up with mom or dad
 
(reply to post at 18:06:00 01/22/15)
I agree with Stan, there's no shame in not answering the phone if you don't recognize the number. Our caller id announces the number verbally on every phone in the house. If we don't recognize it or it's an 800 number(95% of the calls we get), the answering machine picks up. If we recognize the person leaving the message, we pick up (call screening). No shame in that.

BTW, got the same message several times in the past few weeks. checked the numbers (2 or 3 different ones), all from the San Antonio area. Same recording, though. Very Hispanic sounding.
 
I don't have caller ID display phone so I answer whenever it rings--and greeting is simple German Guten Tag/Abend/Morgen depending on time of day, Relatives recognize Mothers family language greeting so no problem. Seems at least 3 voice recognition auto dialers don't respond to German and hang up. The human telemarketers that give short name and start pitch get the 'states attorney says give your legal service address and call back number to verify'. that usually gets a 'CLICK', occasionally some more talk and then I repeat the message and add 'the states attorney advises that I treat you as a lieing crook, scammer, thief and address you as such. One from California got upset about that and started cussin' - told him the states Attorney seemed to be right - he was acting like a lieing, thieving scam artist so he nust be one. some more cussing then the 'Click'. I got a call from Insurance agent that did give legal service address, state license number and gave honest insurance advice for policy for someone with history of cancer - best bet is marry state employee since they could put me on family policy even with preexisting condition- this was before external_linkcare. Neighbor is asking for legal service address and getting lots of "CLICKS". You can learn some interesting words in other languages- I think I've been cussed at in Spanish, Russian, Urdu, Hindi and Bulgarian- not sure exactly as it's usually just a couple words before the hangup. Did get a short conversation in German from a homesick caller, she'd missed home language and greeting of Wie Gehts? helped her admit the charity call was for a 90% administrative operation, better to give to Salvation Army. RN
 
The real IRS doesn't call. They just show up.My sister in law is Korean. She really has fun with them.Served with a Blackfoot Indian. He can speak French and Blackfoot. Mixes them up when talking to the scammers
 

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