SCORE - For the Life of Your Business Subscribe | Whitelist Us IRS Warns of Pervasive Telephone Scam October 2013 IR-2013-84, Oct. 31, 2013 WASHINGTON - The Internal Revenue Service today warned consumers about a sophisticated phone scam targeting taxpayers, including recent immigrants, throughout the country. Victims are told they owe money to the IRS and it must be paid promptly through a pre-loaded debit card or wire transfer. If the victim refuses to cooperate, they are then threatened with arrest, deportation or suspension of a business or drivers license. In many cases, the caller becomes hostile and insulting. This scam has hit taxpayers in nearly every state in the country. We want to educate taxpayers so they can help protect themselves. Rest assured, we do not and will not ask for credit card numbers over the phone, nor request a pre-paid debit card or wire transfer, says IRS Acting Commissioner Danny Werfel. If someone unexpectedly calls claiming to be from the IRS and threatens police arrest, deportation or license revocation if you dont pay immediately, that is a sign that it really isnt the IRS calling. Werfel noted that the first IRS contact with taxpayers on a tax issue is likely to occur via mail Other characteristics of this scam include: · Scammers use fake names and IRS badge numbers. They generally use common names and surnames to identify themselves. · Scammers may be able to recite the last four digits of a victims Social Security Number. · Scammers spoof the IRS toll-free number on caller ID to make it appear that its the IRS calling. · Scammers sometimes send bogus IRS emails to some victims to support their bogus calls. · Victims hear background noise of other calls being conducted to mimic a call site. · After threatening victims with jail time or drivers license revocation, scammers hang up and others soon call back pretending to be from the local police or DMV, and the caller ID supports their claim. If you get a phone call from someone claiming to be from the IRS, heres what you should do: If you know you owe taxes or you think you might owe taxes, call the IRS at 800-829-1040. The IRS employees at that line can help you with a payment issue - if there really is such an issue. If you know you dont owe taxes or have no reason to think that you owe any taxes (for example, youve never received a bill or the caller made some bogus threats as described above), then call and report the incident to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration at 800-366-4484. If youve been targeted by this scam, you should also contact the Federal Trade Commission and use their FTC Complaint Assistant at FTC.gov. Please add IRS Telephone Scam to the comments of your complaint. Taxpayers should be aware that there are other unrelated scams (such as a lottery sweepstakes) and solicitations (such as debt relief) that fraudulently claim to be from the IRS. The IRS encourages taxpayers to be vigilant against phone and email scams that use the IRS as a lure. The IRS does not initiate contact with taxpayers by email to request personal or financial information. This includes any type of electronic communication, such as text messages and social media channels. The IRS also does not ask for PINs, passwords or similar confidential access information for credit card, bank or other financial accounts. Recipients should not open any attachments or click on any links contained in the message. Instead, forward the e-mail to [email protected]. More information on how to report phishing scams involving the IRS is available on the genuine IRS website, IRS.gov. You can reblog the IRS tax scam alert via Tumblr. SCORE Santa Barbara sbscore.org Has SCORE helped your business? Give back to SCORE to help entrepreneurs succeed: Donate today. This e-newsletter is sent to all individuals who signed up to receive it at score.org. We do not sell, rent or trade the names on our email list. Your email address is only used to send messages from SCORE. Visit score.org to view SCOREs Privacy Policy. Brought to you by SCORE, Americas free and confidential source of small business mentoring and coaching. SCORE is a nonprofit association of more than 13,000 volunteer business experts. SCORE offers free mentoring and low-cost workshops nationwide. A resource partner with the U.S. Small Business Administration, SCORE has helped more than 9 million small business clients since 1964. Call 1-800-634-0245 for the SCORE office near you or visit online at SCORE. © Copyright 2012. SCORE Association. All rights reserved.
Posted on: Sat, 02 Nov 2013 04:39:44 +0000
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