Consumer Alert Archives - AFCPE

Life After the Equifax Data Breach…

Rachael Deleon — Wed, 27 Jun 2018 14:14:43 +0000

The Equifax data breach forever changed the landscape of consumer data protection. For consumers, it was the ﬁrst time that a breach exposed at one time essentially all the components an identity thief needs to commit a variety of crimes. Because the hacked information included names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, addresses, and in some instances, driver’s license numbers, the steps recommended for consumers to protect themselves were no longer easy or quick. From that point on, it became clear that people need a more comprehensive strategy to reduce the likelihood that they will be victims in the future. One approach that may help is to look at what a thief can do with your information and possible steps to take:

Steal Your Information – Thieves might steal your personal information to either sell it to others or use it themselves to commit a variety of crimes. Check to see if Equifax thinks your information was compromised and to sign up for one year of free credit monitoring (available whether or not your information was compromised). Sign up for credit monitoring before freezing your credit.

www.equifaxsecurity2017.com (Equifax Security Breach Site)

Commit Existing Account Fraud – The thief may use your existing credit card, bank account, internet payment account, etc. to get money or pay for items they receive. Monitor your accounts carefully, checking every transaction to be sure that it is yours. Report all suspicious transactions, even very small ones. Set alerts on your accounts, so that you will be notiﬁed of transactions and can spot unusual activity. Find out about fraud/security protections of your 401(k) or other investment plan company.
Commit New Account Fraud – The thief may open a new credit card account, bank account, internet payment account, wireless service, or auto, personal, or student loan in your name. Opt out of pre‐approved credit oﬀers. Consider fraud alerts and/or freezes at each of the credit reporting agencies and bank account veriﬁcation agencies:

www.optoutprescreen.com (Opt‐out of pre‐approved credit oﬀers.) https://www.freeze.equifa x.com/Fr eeze/jsp/SFF_PersonalIDInfo.jsp (Equifax Freeze) https://www.experian.com/freeze/center.html (Experian Freeze)

https://freeze.transunion.com/ (Trans Union Freeze)

h ttps://www.innovis.com/personal/securityFreeze (Innovis Freeze)

www.chexsystems.com (Chexsystems Freeze – Click on “Security Freeze” on the menu.)

https://www.firstdata.com/content/dam/FirstData/telecheck/telecheck-file-report.html (Request Telecheck report – no freeze information listed.)

https://www.earlywarning.com/consumer-information.html (Request Early Warning report ‐ no freeze information listed.)

https://www.askcertegy .com /FACT.jsp (Request Certegy report ‐ no freeze information listed.)

Commit Criminal Identity Theft – The thief may use your name and information during interactions with law enforcement, leading to arrest warrants or court proceedings in the victim’s name. (Seek professional/legal advice if this occurs.)
Commit Employment Identity Theft – The thief may get a job using your name and Social Security number. Activate your Social Security account online to conﬁrm the accuracy of your earnings and beneﬁts statement. Periodically check to be sure that only your own earnings are being reported. A security freeze at Equifax will block the ability to set up an SSA account online but will not aﬀect existing accounts. If you already have an account, consider blocking electronic access to at the link listed below.

www.ssa.gov

www.socialsecurity.gov/blockaccess (Block all electronic access to your Social Security information.)

https://blog.ssa.gov/protecting-your-social-security/

Commit Medical Identity Theft – The thief may use your information to get access to health care. Sign up for an online account through your insurer. Monitor your healthcare accounts and statements carefully. Report any medications, treatments, or providers that are not consistent with care you have received.
Commit Mortgage Fraud – The thief may get a mortgage in your name or pose as your home’s owner to get the deed transferred into his/her own name. See new account fraud above.
Commit Synthetic Identity Theft – The thief might use your Social Security number in combination with another person’s name and birthdate to create a new, ﬁctitious identity. Monitor your Social Security records for possible fraudulent activity.
Commit Tax Fraud – The thief might ﬁle a tax refund in your name to receive a refund or other funds owed to you. File your taxes as early in the year as possible. Adjust your withholding so that you get the smallest refund possible, in case a thief does try to steal your refund. File an Identity Theft Aﬃdavit with the IRS to ﬂag your account for extra monitoring.

I know all of this sounds scary. Since the information of everyone in my immediate family was compromised in the Equifax breach, I understand. My intent is not to cause fear, but to encourage vigilance. We are wise to take the speciﬁc actions recommended after any data breach. But we can’t stop there. We need to carefully check every statement we receive, request and review every consumer report that is available to us, and verify the credibility of every request for personal information we receive, unfortunately for the rest of our lives. Nothing we can do is guaranteed to prevent a thief from committing these crimes. However, the sooner we notice a problem, the better our chances to resolve it before it becomes a nightmare.

June 27, 2018

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Spotting Vacation Rental Scams

Rachael Deleon — Tue, 15 May 2018 14:37:47 +0000

My family loves Key West, FL. We happened upon it during a cruise, which would have been a disaster, if not for the great group of friends we were with. (Who would have imagined eight-foot waves in the Bahamas?). Our day trip in Key West, on my birthday no less, was the salvation of that vacation.

Fast forward a few years, we decided to return to Key West for New Year’s Eve. This time, we and wanted to rent an apartment within walking distance of downtown. Fortunately, we were not novices to renting apartments for vacation, and my 19 years as a Consumer Protection Investigator had taught me to triple check any contract.

As we began our search, we quickly learned that Key West is quite popular for New Years, and having waited until October to start our search, our options were limited. Most of the places we contacted politely controlled their laughter, letting us know that in order to secure a rental for New Years, you had to book by July. Undaunted, our search continued until we found the perfect place – a 3-bedroom, single family home, close to downtown, with modern beautiful decor and a reasonable price. What was not to like? We had done it–found the “perfect” place in spite of the competitive demand (Sign #1).

The emails had some misspellings (Sign #2) but were very courteous and professional. They had a website with two other properties, so they seemed to be a business. Racing off to work, I implored my husband to make the Paypal deposit as directed by the “business” and use a credit card, of course. When he went to make the deposit, he noticed that the email address was a personal g-mail address, not a business email address (Sign #3). Luckily, that was a red flag for him and he called Key West City government to see if they required a license for rentals and if this “business” had one. The answer was yes followed by a no (Sign #4).

Since we had been provided with an actual property address, I then found the owner of the property and called her. I was surprised that she actually picked up the phone and then not surprised when she immediately told me not to make any payment. This was the second call she had received that week on the scam.

As summer is approaching, if you or your client are considering renting an apartment for a vacation–do it! It’s a great way to integrate into an area and many rentals have more space and amenities than some hotels. But be cautious and do your research. In the example above, we saw 4 classic signs of a scam before confirming that it was indeed a scam. If you see three, cut your lost time and look for another place.

Remember:

If it sounds too good to be true, it is. Look somewhere else.
Check the rental licensing laws and make sure your company has one.
Check the property records to locate the owner of the property. These records are generally public information and can be found by searching property tax records.
If the name of the owner is not the same as the company, try to locate the owner and ask if the rental is legitimate.
Check complaint records on larger rental companies to ensure they don’t have a negative history.
Check out the rentals on the larger, well known sites such as TripAdvisor, VRBO and Airbnb and be aware that CraigsList, while a good site overall, contains a lot of vacation rental scams.
Use a credit card, not your debit card and by no means pay by cash, money order or check until you get to the rental and inspect it.

Fortunately, our story had a happy ending. Disgusted but determined, we continued our rental search and in the true Key West spirit, we received referrals from the locals which resulted in finding rooms in a wonderful hotel. We had an amazing New Year’s trip and avoided a scam.

What are your top tips for spotting vacation rental scams?

Guest Contributor: Sue Rogan, AFC^®, CASH Campaign of Maryland

May 15, 2018

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Debt Collection: Know the Abuses…and Your Rights

Rachael Deleon — Tue, 09 May 2017 15:57:48 +0000

With consumers relying more and more on financing, debt collection has become a major problem for Americans. In January 2017 alone, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) received 7,730 complaints about debt collection, far more than the complaints received for any other financial product or service by a margin of over 2000. In a Consumer Sentinel report published by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), debt collection was the top 2016 consumer complaint category, with 859,090 claims. Over 80 percent of Americans owe some form of debt, so it’s crucial that consumers have the knowledge and access to resources needed to ensure the financial security of themselves and their families.

THREE TYPES OF DEBT COLLECTION PROBLEM AREAS

When we talk about unlawful debt collection, there is an important distinction to draw between three categories:

Beware of legitimate debt collectors attempting to collect on a real debt, but acting in violation of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA), which forbids certain abusive practices by third-party debt collectors.
Beware of phony debt collectors trying to scam victims into paying fake debts.
Beware of a hybridized tactic called “juicing,” where legitimate debt collectors scam their customers by coercing them to overpay their real debts.

REAL PEOPLE: THE IMPACT OF DEBT COLLECTION ABUSES

Here are recent examples of how debt collection problems are hitting everyday Americans:

A man who for years was harassed by a debt collector was recently awarded $10 million in court. Aside from the significant dollar figure, his story isn’t rare. A legitimate but aggressive debt collection agency called Financial Credit Services Inc., also known as Asset Recovery Associates or ARA, hit the victim with persistent, harassing calls. At the time, the victim was just scraping by on Social Security and a small pension. Then the debt collectors obliterated his savings. To make the harassment even more egregious, the victim’s lawyer said that the debt was likely decades beyond the statute of limitations or possibly even “completely bogus.” The FDCPA lays out rules about what constitutes “harassment,” as well as when, how and how often a collector can contact a consumer, and other collection tactics deemed unlawful.
The FTC recently announced a large settlement with a legitimate debt collection company that used unlawful tactics to collect debts. Here’s how it worked: The company left phone messages that illegally disclosed purported debts to individuals other than the consumer without permission, and bombarded consumers with excessive phone calls after being told that the person who answered did not owe the debt or could not be reached. The company also got in trouble for falsely claiming that it would prevent its employees from illegally calling third parties about a debtor and other offenses.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) recently posted a video about “Brian,” an Army forward observer in Iraq. Brian was targeted by scammers after returning home and enrolling in college. He started receiving debt collection calls from a third-party debt collector he didn’t recognize. By sending a validation letter to the company, Brian and his attorney were able to determine that Brian was being targeted by scammers. But not all consumers are so lucky.
Some unscrupulous third-party debt collectors have devised a new tactic to scam consumers. In a practice known as “juicing” (also prohibited under FDCPA), collectors falsely overstate the amount of money debt consumers owe on a legitimate debt. Just last year, the owner of a company call 4 Star Resolution was found guilty of coercing thousands of victims into overpaying their debts. “[He] ran a massive, fraudulent debt-collection scheme through which he and his cohorts stole over $31 million from his vulnerable victims,” said Preet Bharara, U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. “Thomas instructed his debt collectors to threaten, intimidate, and lie to their victims by overstating their debts and making false claims about what would happen to them if they didn’t pay up.”

CONSUMER TIPS: HOW TO PROTECT YOURSELF

Here are tips for dealing with aggressive third-party debt collectors and possible scammers:

If you receive a call from an unfamiliar company, ask the debt collector for his or her name, company, street address, and telephone number. Tell the caller you won’t discuss any debt until you get a written “validation notice.”
The FDCPA requires any debt collector to stop calling if you ask in writing. If the debt is real, sending such a letter does not get rid of the debt, but it should stop the contact.
When in doubt, ask your creditor. When dealing with third-party debt collectors, it should be apparent what the debt was for and where it originated. In some cases, the debt may be legitimate while the third-party debt collector is not.
Still in doubt? Ask a professional. Seek the guidance of an Accredited Financial Counselor^® (AFC^®), licensed financial advisor, or lawyer. Here’s a good place to start: https://www.afcpe.org/find-an-afc.
Report possible scammers. File a complaint with the FTC and your state Attorney General.
To learn more about debt collection and debt collection scams, the Consumer Protection Commission (FTC)and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau offer excellent resources.

If you have reason to believe you are being targeted by tactics considered unlawful under the FDCPA or feel you may be the victim of a scam, consult a lawyer or a trusted financial professional. If you do not have or cannot afford a financial advisor, consider getting help from an AFC^® (Accredited Financial Counselor^®), who can offer professional insight on your matter. Unlike advisors, an AFC^® professional focuses less on providing investment advice and more on helping individuals and families address fundamental financial issues. This often includes educating clients in sound financial principles, helping clients overcome debt, and modifying ineffective money management behavior.

May 09, 2017

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