Three Financial Scams. Don’t Fall Victim To Them!
Financial scams often go unreported and can be difficult to prosecute. Here are three common scams and what you can do to avoid them:
1. Medicare and Health Insurance Scams: People pose as Medicare representatives to try and get your personal information; other times, they set up mobile clinics then use the personal information the patient provides to bill Medicare and pocket the money. Just know that a legitimate Medicare employee would never ask you for your personal information over the phone or by e-mail since they already have it on file.
2. Counterfeit Prescription Drugs: These scams operate on the Internet. Victims end up paying money for drugs that don’t do anything for their medical condition; even worse, some run the risk of taking unsafe substances. This scam is not only hard on the wallet; it could be devastating to your body.
3. Telemarketing and Phone Scams: These are the most common types of scams. There’s no face-to-face interaction and no paper trail so they’re incredibly hard to trace and identify. To make matters worse, once a deal has been made, your name is then shared with other scammers looking for easy targets. Typically, they tell you they found a large sum of money and are willing to split it with you if you’ll make a good-faith payment; or they convince you to wire or send money after convincing you a relative or friend is in the hospital or stranded overseas and needs money urgently; and of course, the most popular one right now is fake charities which really pick up after natural disasters.
Avoiding financial scams will move you closer to being able to experience your version of an incredible retirement — doing what you want, when you want.
