One more victim well known in Greece “false accountant” schemes was an 84-year-old woman from the village of Domokos municipality in Phthiotida. The scammers convinced her to collect all the money she kept at home and leave package with €20,000 on the street.
The scam took place on the afternoon of September 24th. An unknown person called an elderly woman and introduced himself her accountant’s employee.
Under the pretext of some financial obligation, he convinced her to collect all the cash in the house.
An 84-year-old woman put €20,000 in a plastic bag and, following the instructions of the interlocutor, left him at the appointed place near her house.
The scammer’s accomplices, who were apparently nearby, took the package and fled.
Realized too late
Only after some time did the woman realize that she had become a victim of deception and contacted the Domokos police department.
Police are now identifying the participants in the scheme and trying to determine the vehicle and routes they may have taken.
The method of deception itself is far from new. Athens News has repeatedly reported on cases where criminals posed as accountants, tax officials, ΔΕΔΔΗΕ or even relatives and convinced older people to give them money and jewelry. All such cases can be viewed using the search query “false accountant”.
In Phthiotis, this scheme has already brought tens of thousands of euros to criminals
Just a few days before the new case, the police reported the discovery of two groups operating in Phthiotis according to the same scheme.
According to Ελληνική Αστυνομία, in August alone, participants in these groups received more €95,000. In one episode, the scammers also posed as “accountants” and directed accomplices directly to the victim’s home to obtain money and valuables.
The official police report is available on the website Ελληνική Αστυνομία.
What should immediately alert you
The police regularly remind: no real accountant, no tax office, no bank will send a person to your house for cash, gold or other valuables.
Particularly dangerous signs are:
- requirement to urgently collect money or jewelry;
- please put them in a bag and leave them near the house;
- threats of fines, tax problems or “urgent audit”;
- prohibition on calling relatives or your real accountant;
- a promise that the money “will be collected by the employee.”
If such a call is received, the police recommend stopping the conversation and independently contacting a relative, accountant or organization on behalf of which the call is supposedly made.
Editorial comment.
The most dangerous thing about this scheme is its simplicity. Fraudsters do not require complex banking transactions and do not try to force a person to understand technology. They play on the trust of an elderly person in familiar words: “accountant”, “tax”, “fine”, “debt”.
And then they turn a telephone conversation into an almost physically real procedure: someone actually comes for money. This is why this kind of deception continues to work for years.
There is only one main rule here: if someone on the phone asks to take cash or jewelry out of the house, the conversation must be stopped immediately.
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