Publishers Clearing House scammers and others

[Debp]

I've had several phone calls from a guy at "PCH" who always tells me I've won $5 million dollars!   Plus a car, one time!   Just have to send several hundred dollars to pay taxes upfront.

And what a lucky family we are: a month or so after I got the phone call, my mother also won 5 million! 

It's always the same scammer that phones.    Has anyone else heard from this guy?    He has a peculiar, drawn out, sort of twang voice!

Any other funny scams?

[ayin jade]

I don't think it's funny but I am one of the first who got the irs phone scam calls. I panicked and believing it was fake called the real irs. Have you ever called the real irs? Talk about scary.

For awhile I also got calls claiming a sheriff was on his way to arrest me unless I paid money on the phone. Didn't fall for that one.

I moved in 2021 and got a landline for the sole purpose of it my parents being able to contact me at home in an emergency. I get calls daily from all over the country. They never leave messages but try to get me to give them money if I answer.

[teddyv]

We had the calls allegedly from CRA, our equivalent of the IRS, which almost sounded legitimate. Then they started in Chinese. Then it became immigration related, also in Chinese, and now I've been getting calls from courier companies.

[Marathoner]

A while back, I received calls from a computerized voice informing me that there was "a federal warrant for my arrest," but I never made it to the hook by the time I hung up laughing. I LOLed and then ROTFLOLed because at that time, federal authorities knew precisely where I was. 

Lame. 

For the past week or so, I've been receiving text messages about trouble with a bank account that I don't have with a bank that I've never done business with. Fascinating, no? 

This wasn't a scam, but last week I received a rash of phone calls from a medical provider's office who believed that my name was "Hannah," and that I worked for a VA contractor. I was finally able to get through to my mystery caller to let them know that my name is not Hannah, and that I don't work for a health insurance company under contract to the VA. It was amusing (but pleasant) and the mystery caller was very apologetic. 

[Marathoner]

32 minutes ago, teddyv said:

We had the calls allegedly from CRA, our equivalent of the IRS, which almost sounded legitimate. Then they started in Chinese. Then it became immigration related, also in Chinese, and now I've been getting calls from courier companies.

Awesome! Scammers crack me up and I thoroughly enjoy their lame attempts to bamboozle me. It's so pathetic that it never fails to make my day. 

[The_Patriot21]

6 hours ago, Debp said:

I've had several phone calls from a guy at "PCH" who always tells me I've won $5 million dollars!   Plus a car, one time!   Just have to send several hundred dollars to pay taxes upfront.

And what a lucky family we are: a month or so after I got the phone call, my mother also won 5 million! 

It's always the same scammer that phones.    Has anyone else heard from this guy?    He has a peculiar, drawn out, sort of twang voice!

Any other funny scams?

Lol I once had this dude call me saying my computer had a virus and I needed to pay him to fix it. To which I proceeded to laugh at him and like no that's not possible. He kept insisting so I was like dude it can't have a virus it's broke...he's like that's what I'm saying I'm like no dude I fried my hard drive like 3 months ago, it won't even turn on. He said oh and hung up.

The next day, the same guy called me with the same line. His thick indian accent was a dead giveaway. To which I promptly read him the riot act, told him he needed to stop scamming people and go find a job. I wouldn't even let him get a word in until he hung up.

Well, the guy must have been a glutton for punishment because a week later he called me again with the same scam. This time I told him I was with the FBI cyber security division. He was like Cyber security? I'm like yup. He promptly hung up and never called me again lol.

Now I just get robo calls. Booooring. One can't mess with them lol.

[teddyv]

10 minutes ago, The_Patriot21 said:

Lol I once had this dude call me saying my computer had a virus and I needed to pay him to fix it. To which I proceeded to laugh at him and like no that's not possible. He kept insisting so I was like dude it can't have a virus it's broke...he's like that's what I'm saying I'm like no dude I fried my hard drive like 3 months ago, it won't even turn on. He said oh and hung up.

The next day, the same guy called me with the same line. His thick indian accent was a dead giveaway. To which I promptly read him the riot act, told him he needed to stop scamming people and go find a job. I wouldn't even let him get a word in until he hung up.

Well, the guy must have been a glutton for punishment because a week later he called me again with the same scam. This time I told him I was with the FBI cyber security division. He was like Cyber security? I'm like yup. He promptly hung up and never called me again lol.

Now I just get robo calls. Booooring. One can't mess with them lol.

My favourite "you have a virus caller" was when I challenged him on what computer had the problem since we had a laptop and a desktop. After waffling and insisting there was a.problem I just reiterated again "You called me, so you must know."

"Click"

But yeah, it's all robocalls know.

[missmuffet]

2 hours ago, ayin jade said:

I don't think it's funny but I am one of the first who got the irs phone scam calls. I panicked and believing it was fake called the real irs. Have you ever called the real irs? Talk about scary.

For awhile I also got calls claiming a sheriff was on his way to arrest me unless I paid money on the phone. Didn't fall for that one.

I moved in 2021 and got a landline for the sole purpose of it my parents being able to contact me at home in an emergency. I get calls daily from all over the country. They never leave messages but try to get me to give them money if I answer.

One of the first scam calls I ever got was about IRS. This was several years ago. I called my accountant and he told me they were quite common around tax time. 

[Debp]

Oh, another....the hello grandma scam.

This one guy has called me about three times the past two months.    "Hello grandma!" I just hang up.   I don't bother to tell him I don't have any children.

 

Has anyone seen Scammer Payback?   I watched a few videos on YouTube.   He finds and even has a mole in big scam operations in India.  He hacks them and deletes some of their files before they know it.    He is so smart with a computer that he can do all of this stuff.

He made one scammer think he accidentally put 4 million dollars into the senior citizen's account.   (Scammer Payback pretends to be elderly when phoning them.)

[Not of the World]

I engage them in conversation and mention travel and vacation and then I ask them questions and then I respond by trying to sell them a timeshare and I ask them for their credit card information to pay for it.