A new scam is doing the rounds. It involves phoney delivery cards that you get when a parcel delivery is attempted and you’re out. The cards in question look very similar to those you’ll be familiar with from Royal Mail. The card encourages you to call a phone number that connected to an automated service that asks for your details and the consignment number of the delivery involved. It’s not been reported how widespread the scam is, where it has been centred of whether anyone has fallen for it. Here’s an image of one of the cards that available on the Action Fraud website. A picture of a genuine card can be found above.
A Royal Mail spokesperson says of the phoney cards: “The Royal Mail security team is looking into this incident as a matter of urgency. Customers should check delivery cards very carefully to ensure they are genuine, and remain vigilant. Although this card is similar to one of our Something For You cards, the Royal Mail logo is crucially missing. Customers should also consider whether they are expecting a delivery from the company named on the card”.
There’s no definitive explanation of what the fake cards are trying to achieve. Perhaps it’s about harvesting contact details or maybe the plan is to intercept a future delivery that the recipient is expecting.
That said, it’s fairly unsophisticated and you just need to be vigilant and look out for the Royal Mail logo on any card you receive. Have you received on these cards?
2 Responses
Surely the scam is simply to get people to ring that number, which links to a premium rate line; the automated element, asking for details etc is just to keep you on the line longer. Kerching.