Yesterday, I received a call from my managment counterpart at our other branch in town. She told me that she just dealt with a customer who fell victim to a scam that neither of us had heard of before. She did a little digging and found out it is called the Advance-Fee Loan Scam. This is a particularly evil scam in that it basically leads to identity theft. Here's how it works.
You apply for a loan online, usually with a company that says they don't care about your credit history.
You are asked to forward them the loan processing fee and you will receive a wire for the loan into your bank account.
You wire them the money.
They never send you the loan.
They use all your personal info (provided in the "loan application") to open credit cards in your name.
They use your account info to make fraudulent checks with real name/account info.
The individual that my colleague dealt with wired $3200 to the scammers and wanted us to explain why he hadn't received the loan from them. A little research lead her to info about this scam. He is holding out that going through their "refund" process will work. We unfortunately know better.
Please protect yourselves everyone! If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. With troubled economic times, people are getting even more creative in ways to rip others off. BTW, the money in the case we dealt with was sent to Canada, now it is an international issue. Have a good weekend everyone.
You apply for a loan online, usually with a company that says they don't care about your credit history.
You are asked to forward them the loan processing fee and you will receive a wire for the loan into your bank account.
You wire them the money.
They never send you the loan.
They use all your personal info (provided in the "loan application") to open credit cards in your name.
They use your account info to make fraudulent checks with real name/account info.
The individual that my colleague dealt with wired $3200 to the scammers and wanted us to explain why he hadn't received the loan from them. A little research lead her to info about this scam. He is holding out that going through their "refund" process will work. We unfortunately know better.
Please protect yourselves everyone! If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. With troubled economic times, people are getting even more creative in ways to rip others off. BTW, the money in the case we dealt with was sent to Canada, now it is an international issue. Have a good weekend everyone.