St. Louis, MO -(Effingham Radio)- The invoice you just received looks official. The sender tells you need to act urgently in order to avoid paying any late fees.
While the invoice may be legitimate, there’s also the possibility that it has been sent by a scammer trying to get some of your hard-earned money. These fraudsters will send an invoice for products never ordered that may not exist.
Consumers have reported more than 560 fake invoice scam attempts to Better Business Bureau (BBB) ScamTracker this year. Consumers lost money in 21 percent of these cases with losses as large as $18,000 reported.
A St. Louis school reported to BBB it was targeted in a fake invoice scam attempt. A school employee agreed to let a company send “free samples” of trash bags and gloves. The school later said a customer service representative from the business contacted the school, and said it owed nearly $700 for two cases of trash bags and a case of gloves.
“I did my research, as I always do, on this invoice and found that that this was a scam,” a school representative wrote in a BBB ScamTracker report. “We will not be paying the invoice or sending the product back.”
In another form of the scam, recipient get what looks to be an official notice from a government agency that seeks payment required to stay in compliance with the law.
Scammers may also try to infiltrate businesses with emails that have fake invoices that, when downloaded, contain malware or spyware, which can expose the business to even more problems.
“It is imperative that people check to make sure an invoice is real before making payment,” said Michelle L. Corey, BBB St. Louis president and CEO. “This scam is successful when employees don’t communicate and make a payment believing someone else in the company placed the order.”
BBB is a nonprofit, business-supported organization that sets and upholds high standards for fair and honest business behavior. BBB services to consumers are free of charge. BBB provides objective advice, BBB Business Profiles on more than 5.3 million companies, 11,000 charity reviews, dispute resolution services, alerts and educational information on topics affecting marketplace trust. Visit bbb.org for more information.
