Headline News: Our Super Sleuth Colleague Thwarts Scammers!

Yesterday, one of our ever-vigilant colleagues thwarted one of those pesky scammers, when they rang purporting to be from our credit card company.

The call set off with the scammer asking if we’d tried to make a payment, stating the amount, on our company credit card that morning.  Our colleague replied that they hadn’t, and the caller advised that they would cancel their card and send a new one. 

All sounds very plausible, especially as they knew our company name, however our canny colleague had their suspicions.

Our colleague asked the caller to confirm their name, and the caller knew their first and second name, which would lead you to believe that they were from the card company. However, they weren’t convinced, and they told the caller they thought it was a scam, and he said to prove it was a legit call, he would send a text and ask them to confirm the 6-digit code on the text when it arrived.  A text then arrived from the card company (genuine) but when they read the message, it was asking them to authorise a transaction with a third party for what was not an inconsiderable amount of money. Our colleague rightly refused to give the caller the 6-digit code, and they subsequently hung up. 

Our buyer then contacted our credit card company on the number on their card to cancel it and there were advised that there were currently several scams around like this. The scammers had tried to take the money 3 times, which our colleague confirmed as they’d had 2 missed calls from the same number, finally answering on the third. If our colleague hadn’t followed their gut, and had given them the 6-digit code, they would’ve got the money. 

We undertake a lot of security training at Stonebridge Homes and this proved invaluable when faced with a real life scam attempt.

Fabulous super sleuthing!