Phone fraudster fleeces elderly Kumbia pensioner
BRIAN Fawcett doesn’t own a computer, has never used the internet and pays for everything with cash.
The 80-year-old is an oldschool country bloke who lives a quiet life in Kumbia, and he likes it that way.
So it came as a shock this week when he learnt a phone scammer had managed to steal more than $500 from his NAB bank account.
The culprit had kept the Kumbia resident on the line for more than two hours.
Mr Fawcett said he thought something fishy was going on from the beginning of the phone conversation, but became anxious when the caller claimed to be part of a fraud investigation unit with the National Australia Bank.
“I was at home on Monday when we received a call at 1pm and the caller … said he was from the NAB fraud squad,” Mr Fawcett said.
“When I told him I was going to go to the local NAB in Kingaroy he became quite anxious and kept telling me to stay on the line.
“He kept coming and going from the phone call, saying he was checking on things and looking into our accounts.
“It was startling because he could tell me more about my banking activity than I could tell you myself.”
The pensioner said the fraudster knew his home address, telephone numbers as well as who he was regularly paying bills to and who he was receiving money from, and when.
Knowing something wasn’t right, Mr Fawcett went to the Kingaroy NAB branch to review his statements and discovered $529.45 had been taken out of his account by an unknown party.
NAB has assured him the real fraud investigators were now looking into the case and told Mr Fawcett the funds would be returned to him.
Now he wants to make sure other South Burnett residents know how easily it could happen to them.
“Be alert,” Mr Fawcett said. “If you think something isn’t right, go straight to the bank and look into it.”
A NAB spokeswoman provided the following advice to help customers determine if they were being targeted by a scammer:
• NAB will never ask you to confirm, update or disclose personal or banking information via a link in an email or text message.
• If you receive this type of email or text message, please forward it to phish@nab.com.au and then delete it.
• If you have received this type of email or text message and have clicked on the link or entered your details, please contact your local branch or call 13 22 65 immediately.
• Ensure you carefully read any SMS codes sent to you. If it states “Your NAB secret code is xxxxx. Do not provide this to anyone, even NAB”, do not disclose this code to anyone.
• Treat any unsolicited phone calls with caution. If you’re unsure about the legitimacy of any call, hang up, and call back on an official, publicly listed phone number to verify the call was legitimate.