Shocking scammers- please read, this is important.

Dear reader,

I had to give this its own post. I am really hoping that some of you may be able to pass this information on or may stop this happening to you or someone you know. Perhaps and elderly neighbour, a friends parent or similar.

There are a revolting breed out there who are actively targeting elderly people.  They are usually widows or widowers and live alone ( The victims, not the revolting people). I don't know how they find their details but they do.
This is what they do:

Courier Fraud

They ring the person and pretend to be either from a bank or  a police officer. They tell the person that their bank account or card details have been hacked and they need to cancel their cards or account immediately. They obtain the PIN numbers, address, everything. Let me add as this point that they could be male or female and are VERY convincing. They ask the person to ring their own bank straight away and then end the call.
OR SO IT SEEMS.........
What they actually do is to say goodbye and then stay on the line. The victim dials the number and the scammer is still there and then preset to be the bank. They ask for the details and then confirm to the victim that yes, their account is being hacked but its ok now they can stop it.
To cut a long, long story short, they tell the victim to put all their bank cards in an envelope and to seal it and sign the seal blah, blah blah. They say that the bank will send a courier to collect the cards.
A taxi or courier then turns up and takes the cards away. Bingo. Got the cards, got the PIN number. They then spend on the cards until the victim works out something's wrong a few days later.

The other scam is the old "I am a solicitor and you have won a prize. It's coming from America so you need to pay the tax to release it" blah blah blah.

I know you will be thinking, no one could fall for this, who could be that stupid?

I can assure you there are hundreds and thousands of really lonely, old folk, living alone who often don't see anyone for days, sometimes weeks. They often have a slight bit of dementia and they are getting scammed. The old man I met was 86, a widower. He lives alone and his family (one child) lives abroad. He has lost about £50 k so far. He looks after himself, cooks, cleans etc and said the man was so convincing he just can't believe that it's a scam. The "solicitor" has been ringing him twice a week for over a year!

He showed me some of his other paperwork. I can tell you he must be the most insured, covered, protected and warranteed person in the world. He has been sold every policy there is. He has insurance on his insurance. It makes me mad. They are scamming and screwing these people out of their heating money and they don't care.

When I asked him why he didn't check it with someone he told me he had no one to ask, no one to check with.

I am asking you, please could you make yourself known to an elderly neighbour or pass this information on? I know you would all help someone out anyway as you're that kind of people but maybe you could just remind an elderly person to check with you or someone before they give anyone any money.

It's a sad world sometimes.