Crooks Using Health Care Ruling to Run Phone Scams, Feds Warn

No sooner had the U.S. Supreme Court ruled on the Affordable Care Act than phone scammers began using it as a hook, the Federal Trade Commission warned today.

According to the FTC, telephone scam artists are "saying that under the Affordable Care Act, they need to verify some information."

For example, a caller might say that they have the routing number of a person's bank, and then use that information to get the person to reveal the entire account number. Other times, they have asked for credit card numbers, Social Security numbers, Medicare ID, or other personal information.

Among the health care-related scams, in Utah, seniors have reportedly gotten phone calls informing them that they need new Medicare cards as a result of the law, according to the Healthreform.gov website that tracks fraud reports.

Seniors won't be issued new Medicare cards, and do not need to register with anyone to receive rebate checks after they hit the prescription drug coverage gap known as the "donut hole," the site states.

In Wyoming, a fraudulent caller has claimed to be from Medicare and asked to for seniors' Medicare numbers. The government stresses that Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security numbers should never be given to strangers.

The FTC's advice: "If someone who claims to be from the government calls and asks for your personal information, hang up. It's a scam."

Comments

[bond arbitrage]

Hi Jenna,

I agree, among the health care-related scams, in Utah, seniors have reportedly gotten phone calls informing them that they need new Medicare cards as a result of the law

[property rights]

Hi Jenna, thanks for this information. This is very helpful for all people to become aware about this scam. In fact i received several phone calls like this and what i did is i just hang up the phone after asking my personal info.

[Michael Dwells]

My mom got a call like that, too. The man told her she was getting a new ID card but she needed to verify a few personal information first. But of course, she knew it was a scam. She's read about the scam at Callercenter.com and she's as skeptical as a math teacher.

She old me about it and we reported the phone number to the website and alerted the local police, too.

[Anne Roberts]

I think most people need to know this, sometimes the lack of knowledge of certain things can most likely be one's downfall. It pays to be informed. Thanks for this piece of information.