Posts Tagged ‘ Scammer ’

Gas & Electric Bills Paid by President Obama? (Scam Alert)

June 30th, 2012. By AbiK

Heard there’s a new federal program that’ll pay your utility bills? Well, hundreds of utility customers in New York City and undoubtedly thousands more across the nation have been receiving phone calls and fliers—some even text messages—claiming that President Obama will pick up the tab on their utility bills. Apparently he’ll do this by giving customers credits or by actually paying the utility bill.

Talk about spirit of generosity coming off of that Obamacare win! (“win” being relative to which side of the political fence you’re on…)

Unfortunately, it’s not true.

No, President Obama is not offering to pay your utility bills. Nor are the legislative or judicial branches of our government. It’s a utilities scam and you, dear citizen, will have to retain the glorious honor of paying your bill.

Here’s how the ‘Obama Pays Your Utility Bill” scam works:

Utilities customers are contacted by the scammer. They’re told that President Obama is offering to pay their utility bills as part of a new federal program.

To participate, customers are told all they have to do is provide their social security and band routing numbers. The scammer then provides a fake bank routing number that will purportedly be used to pay their utility bills.

Needless to say, there is no bank account with any money that will pay the utility bill.

And guess who’s credit is affected when the utility bills are late or unpaid? The customer.

Meanwhile, the scammer has the information he needs to drain your real bank account and then some.

The Better Business Bureau (BBB) provides the following tips to avoid falling for the utility bill payment scam:

Tags: BBB, Better Business Bureau, President Obama, Scammer, Utility Bill, Utility Bill Scam
Posted in Consumer Fraud, Emerging Issues, Scam | No Comments »