"Tax Refund Notification" Topic

I recently ordered some miniatures and other gaming materials from the UK, and today this email arrived from HM Revenue & Customs <reveneuk AT gov . uk . com> .

(I added some spaces and changed the "at" sign in order to prevent this from turning into an actual, active link on TMP.)

Since the refund amount is far greater than any of the purchases I made, it most certainly seems to be a scam.

However, I thought it might be a good idea to post here as just FYI to other US-based gamers ordering from UK.

RECALCULATION OF YOUR TAX REFUND
HMRC 2015
LOCAL OFFICE No. 3819
TAX CREDIT OFFICER: Lisa Frank
TAX REFUND ID NUMBER: 381716209
REFUND AMOUNT: 195.98 GBP

Dear Applicant,

The contents of this email and any attachments are confidential and as
applicable, copyright in these is reserved to HM Revenue & Customs.
Unless expressly authorized by us, any further dissemination or
distribution of this email or its attachments is prohibited.

If you are not the intended recipient of this email, please reply to
inform us that you have received this email in error and then delete it
without retaining any copy.

I am sending this email to announce: After the last annual calculation of
your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a
tax refund of 195.98 GBP

Complete your TAX REFUND NUMBER ID: 381716209 by clicking here

After completing the form, please submit the form by clicking the SUBMIT
button on form and allow us 5-9 business days in order to process it.

Sincerely,

Lisa Frank
HMRC Tax Credit Office
Preston
TAX REFUND ID: UK381716209-HMRC

© Copyright 2015, HM Revenue & Customs UK All rights reserved.

This is a standard scam aimed at uk taxpayers..

Mike

I think you are right and that it is a scam. It's a very clever one as it doesn't contain any of the usual obvious typos or grammatical mistakes.

The giveaway though is the emphasis both in the body of the message and in the footer about "copyright". The copyright of anything produced by a UK government department is "Crown Copyright". This is not the same as copyright for commercial organisations and is not usually explicitly stated.
For further information see:
PDF link

Dear applicant is a dead give away. You can be damn sure if HMRC wants to give you some money back they will know your name…

Scam – any tax rebate is sent as a cheque in the post directly to the tax payer's address.

I am glad that they copyright the attachments. We'd hate for this scam to be used by anyone else.

I'd be suspicious of anything calling itself government correspondence coming to my e-mail address.

Thanks for confirming.

The first tip-off was the huge refund amount of 195.98 GBP. My total purchases weren't this much! I wish…

If I had thought it was legitimate, my next step would have been to contact the UK vendors I used. They would have warned me off right quick, I'm sure. Thanks again, all.

I don't know. Better check it out with the Nigerian oil Minister first.

If they do not know your name, unless it is Mr. Applicant, must be a scam.

Dear Ooh Rah

Here in the states we get these thing all the time. Many times it will be a phone scam. They will call up and ask for information like the password to your bank account so they can direct deposit it.

While it's cruel to do and I sympathize with some people who have to earn their money making phone surveys, I have made it a policy to adopt the following procedure.

Phone rings…

Me: Hello?

Them: Hello Mr. Schmidt???

Me: "I'm sorry I can neither confirm or deny that this is he party you wish to speak to.

Them: Is this 555-555-5555?

Me: I'm sorry I can neither confirm nor deny that you have reached that number.

Them: Mr. Schmidt we have your….

Me: I'm sorry I can neither confirm nor deny that that is the person you are seeking or that this telephone is at the location you say.

Them: But our records state that this phone is registered to xXXXXxx

Me: I'm sorry I can neither confirm nor deny the accuracy of your records. Nor can I verify that this phone conversation is or is not taking place and if it is or is not taking place that you are actually speaking to a person

If they are persistant I suggest that if they wish that the conversation continue with them referring to me as "Hypothetical respondent of unknown location and number.'

If it's a sales call or a survey I always ask questions. For example..

Them: Mr. Schmidt what would you say is the most…

Me: I'm sorry I cannot tell you what Mr. Schmidt says nor can I confirm or denty the identity, location or existence of such a person. I am as I said a hypothetical respondant of unknown…

They say oK and ask "Ok What would you say is the most serious issue facing America today?

They then rattle off four choices, My answer is invariably.

Me: None of those are what I consider the most serious issue facing America today.

Them: with a hint of desperation, "But I don't have any other choices listed on the surven.

Me: Well then your survey is inadequate. It only lists these four!

them: Can you tell me of those four which is the most dangerous?

Me: Does the question say which of these four, if it does not say which of these four, but says, "most" then that is not the proper question and you would be reporting erroneous data.

This goes on for a while until they become frustrated or exasperated and hang up. I've kept them stringing on the line for an hour and a half once.

For example, when they used the word "virtue" once I asked them to define it.

Now you may think this is cruel or sadistic. But I submit to you that in holding up these people for so long I have delayed them calling others and bothering them. and second.

It works!

Since I have been doing this these calls have dropped by 85%
or more, so that now I am rarely bothered by them..

darn!

My soon to be wife, the Widow of the Formerly Dead Nigerian Oil Minister told me that this is a scam.

Thank God I can trust her!

Here is my way of dealing with nuisance calls.

Nuisance "Hello, my name is John and I am from Windows Help centre" delivered in an Indian accent
Me, "Hello Pete, stop acting silly."
Nuisance, "Hello, I am from Windows Help centre."
Me, "No Pete, you put on this daft accent last month."
Nuisance, "I am from Windows Help centre and ring about your computer."
Me, "What time are meeting down the pub tonight?"
Nuisance, "It will only take a minute."
Me ,"Come on Pete, what time are meeting down the pub tonight?"
Nuisance puts the phone down.
RESULT!

I was recently notified by the UN, no less, that there was $17.5 USD million dollars awaiting transfer to my ATM Card. I had the choice of same day credit to my ATM Card for a fee of $380.00 USD plus a $60.00 USD fee to the UN department handling this for me. Second day transfer fee was $280.00 USD plus the $60.00 USD fee. The entire e-mail was quite lengthy and the UN department handling this pesky matter for me had a title about ten words long. Just why the UN had this money for me was more than a bit vague. I assumed it was a refund to all retired US citizens for a lifetime of being royally screwed by the UN. Alas, I am already totally involved with Mr. Oweri Ojukwu who managed to get himself and $7.5 USD million to South Africa but needs my help to get all safely to America. That, and my PayPal account is in dire danger of either being limited or nuked outright if I don't provide the required information. If that isn't worrisome enough Lloyd's Bank, HFC Bank (whoever they are), and a small mob of lust-ridden women are all pressuring me to do something or else. The banks don't worry me much since I have no accounts there unless the UN or Mr. Ojukwu are involved. The lust-ridden women want to sell me various drugs to offset ED as well as offer me more personal services. Man oh man when will this mad whirlwind existence ever cease?

I like Otto's method. I can't emulate him though as all our nuisance calls are pre-recorded messages. Usually about mis-sold PPI….

A number of years ago, I worked at a company where 90% of the employees were East Indian. I developed a very good accent from them, so when Windows from India calls I just start babbling in an East Indian Accent even they cannot understand. They hang up.

Or if they ask for the man of the house, I just say "you've got her". They hang up.

Lets see.
Got call from IRS saying I was in default for IRS payment on 3 separate occasions.
How to know fraud:
1) IRS will first send a letter explaining what is wrong (did have this happen once and fixed the problem).
2) Will not contact you by auto dialer but will have a real human call you.
3) Human who does call will be understandable and not have such an extreme accent (Indian twice and other once) that it was difficult to understand.

The fun scam was when I got a call and caller said he was from FedEx and had a package for me. I was on my computer and brought up the FedEx tracking site and asked for the tracking id. He gave it to me and about the time he asked for my address I told him that it was an invalid tracking id and he hung up.

@ Ottoathome

Dave

The tax/bank/paypal scams are a bit boring to be fair. I prefer the scams with a bit of imagination. A few of my favorites are

1) the elderly US lady who is dying, but has fallen out with her family, and doesn't want to give them a penny of her estate. Fair enough I suppose, one would assume she'd give her millions to a local charity, but no she picks me a foreign national, she has never met, who she some how tracked down on the internet to leave her vast fortune to…happy days

2) Being contacted by the daughter of the famous Libyan general Shamuses O'Malley (assumingly his ancestors were of Irish stock)who has millions in smuggled Gaddafi gold waiting in Chad and wanted my help to smuggle it to the UK for a 10% cut.

3) An e-mail from the World Health Organisation informing me I had been picked to be the UKs representative for tackling Ebola. As such I would receive a huge salary, a company car and all expenses paid trips around the globe. Apparently after careful research they had identified me, a Gardener by trade, as the perfect person to combat the Ebola epidemic…

I like to build up a rapport with the scam-caller and then tell them "You sound nice Raj… I think you should know that I'm naked…"

Can you be prosecuted for making an obscene phonecall if they called you…?

;)

There is a guy in the UK who has registered a premium business number and when a scam calls he keeps them talking for as long as he can. Claims he's made over £2.00 GBPk this year.

Depending on how busy I am, I either just say 'I'm sorry, I do not accept cold calls. Goodbye.' And put the phone down.

Or, if I'm feeling a tad naughty, I go into Jervis mode…

youtu.be/O8WhP49UCfc

Her Majesty's Revenue & Customs (HMRC) use email addresses in the format first name dot last name at hmrc.gsi.gov.uk they are also very keen to avoid the use of email. There is a strict email protocol that came into place sometime in the last couple of months that requires taxpayers or their agents to formally agree to contact via email.

Its quite sad that I can quote the email format off the top of my head don't you think!

Biggest giveaway that it's a scam is the statement give us 5 to 6 days if it's HMRC it should say 5 to 6 months 😂

With nuisance calls, sound interested but ask them to hang on while you turn the cooking down. That's all.

Btw – all UK government email addresses would be gov.uk , i.e. no "com" for commercial at the end. Addresses can be spoofed but an obviously wrong one is wrong.