By Rosie Preston
Just about the time that I thought I had covered anything and everything that could come up, particularly with my online banking account, I was wrong.
This past week, I received first an email and then a phone call from a man providing information that seemed legal. He told me his name was Roger and sent me his credentials along with his employee ID, a phone number and an email to my personal account.
I’ve continued to ask myself if I am truly a Dumb or Dumber character. In short, I allowed this unknown man to keep me on the phone pretending to be an employee of the Federal Investigation Unit of the United States, and I, the dumb lady that I am, believed everything he said as we drove to the bank.
That is, until we pulled into our bank’s parking lot.
It was at that point when I began to doubt him. I walked into my bank while still talking to him on the phone. I found a bank clerk and whispered in her ear, “I have a man on the phone telling me to withdraw $5,000, and I don’t know what to do.”
The clerk immediately told me that this has been happening a lot, and that the bank recently helped another senior who was in the middle of withdrawing her money while being similarly scammed. The reason she got the bank clerk’s attention is because she was holding her phone a certain way.
With that information, I hung up on him. Mrs. Savanah spent nearly an hour closing our current accounts and opening a new one. As my husband Phil and I left the bank I said, “It seems like I’m too naïve, because I continue to be surprised by people who sound or look professional and they turn out to be thieves.”
This is a little embarrassing to share, but when we finally arrived home I went straight to our sofa and cried. I don’t mean just a little cry; I wept for a very long time.
When I first received the call, Phil took the phone and asked the man several questions and told me it was a scam. So, between me using my intuition and him using his common sense, we still have money in our bank account.
With Thanksgiving just around the corner, I realize that I don’t have to change. I’m not giving up on people, but I will trust my intuition from now on!
Contact Rosie Preston at rosie.preston@yahoo.com.