Hi everyone, we moved back to England 2 years ago and just this morning I had an email from Les Impots saying they owe us 380€…the site looks authentic (don’t they all) but they are asking for bank details. I have received Inland Revenue scams and this is similar…has anyone else had one of these emails? TIA
I had a payment directly into my account. Does anyone know when the tax rebate comes through is it in July?
I've had a couple of these emails, purporting to be from the gouvernmente.fr; my advice ,just delete and forget them Maria.
Normally these kinds of scams are easy to spot:
From address is not correct (the real from email address, not what shows as From name)
Reply To address is not correct, similarily
The link you are asked to click is not correct (don't click, just point to the link to spot where it goes to.
Example: during last weeks I have received several emails asking me to confirm my Paypal account information. The From name shows as secure@paypal.com but the real from email address is intl_p@pl.com. Already this is enough to press the Junk button.
http://www.economie.gouv.fr/dgccrf/Publications/Vie-pratique/Fiches-pratiques/Phishing-hameconnage-ou-filoutage might be a starting point.
Some ISPs provide multiple email addresses. A gite dedicated email address with a email client on a separate computer (ideally non MS Windows operating system) will provide some protection from viruses and trojans. if you have a dedicated website for the gite busines with booking enquiries to e.g. booking@mygiteWebSite.fr might also help.
Thanks for the link David…have just joined up.
There is a good explanation (in English) of all the various types of fraud about on the actionfraud website I gave the link for earlier
If for any reason you suspect that the fraudster is UK based you can find details of how to report at http://www.actionfraud.police.uk/ I believe that this is in some way connected with the City of London Police who are heavily involved if fraud issues
As for France I'm not sure
We did reply to the first message because it looked genuine ( we have been in this game for 8 years and have spotted many. As I said, this looked like a genuine enquiry right up to the point of him proposing to overpay.
As I said, we run Gites. It’ s impossible to run them without opening e- mail marked ’ booking enquiry’ !
Does anyone know anywhere in France ( not UK ) to report this to? Tia.
I treat ALL similar emails as an attempt to obtain your identity. In the UK many sites HMRC, banks have a section (often phishing or security) that the receiver can forward the suspicious email to. Then I delete the message. I reccomend thatyou do not reply as this confirms your email, and never open any attachment.
Which police site did you report it to Raymond?
Scam,,,,Spam!
PS. We run Gites. Easy target.
Re. Over payment scam. We had one- very convincing- just yesterday. Does anyone know how to report this to French authorities (and are they bothered?)(apologies for hijacking the post)
We received one of these emails too, a while ago. It looked very official and the amount in question was enticingly small! Definitely a scam. We receive rebates via check. This year we added a RIB with our tax return at their request. Delete it.
Possibly a bit like mail shots always used to result in about 2% sales. I suppose if they send enough out they may get a few profitable ones back.
While on the subject of scams I recently advertised an original oil painting on Angl Info. I got just one reply which instantly seemed odd but a price was negotiated and I assumed he would want to inspect before finalising. But no a ridiculous email arrived offering to pay me more and he would send a cheque then a courier to pick up the painting. A cheque did in fact arrive (x 10 the price!). I did some checking and found that several other people reported a similar scam on Bon Coin and Anglo Info. The envelope with the cheque was postmarked Edinburgh and I reported the matter to the UK authorities based with the City of London Police. Apparently the scam is they contact you once you have banked the cheque. French banks instantly credit your account but retain the right to debit bad cheques later. Meanwhile he contacts you and asks you to return the overpayment element and asssuing your own payment is good he has your cash and the painting. He asks you to pay by Western Union or similar or maybe UK cheque. Apparently they have used the scam for cars as well.
I think it's unanimous. It's a scam. One wonders how they got your details though.
it's a scam! :-O