An Assisted Living Facility in Waupaca Explains Senior Scams, Part 1—There is a lot of scamming that goes on. Lots of times these scams target the senior population on purpose. Our assisted living community in Waupaca wants to bring awareness to the issues and how to combat them. Recently there has been a lot of activity on cell phones and emails that tell you a password has been compromised and then ask you to send your password to an unnamed source.
It’s easy for Senior citizens to get confused and send this sensitive information. Often people scam older individuals by telling them they’ve won a contest and sometimes the fraudsters are very convincing. Here are some things our assisted living facility in Waupaca wants our residents to do should they be a victim of these calls.
Our Assisted Living Facility in Waupaca Explains Red Flag #1 – The caller wants to get you angry, scared, and confused so you think irrationally.
Regrettably, this sort of devious scenario happens all the time. In a report released by a Senate committee in January 2019, older adults lose an estimated $2.9 billion each year to financial scams. The most prevalent scam, out of more than 1,500 complaints to the panel’s hotline, involves IRS impersonators who conned seniors into paying tens of millions of dollars.
According to a survey by the Investor Protection Trust, a nonprofit devoted to investor education, 17 percent of Americans aged 65 or older—more than 6.8 million seniors—were taken advantage of financially with an ill-chosen investment, very high fees for financial services, or even just outright deception resulting in fraud.
Our Assisted Living Facility in Waupaca Explains Red Flag #2 – Targeting the Vulnerable
Older people are more susceptible for several reasons. First, seniors tend to have savings and retirement. Scammers know this. All of these things make seniors very attractive to swindlers. Also, the boomer generation (today’s seniors) were raised to be more polite and trusting. Con artists exploit this, knowing it’s harder for them to say “no” or just hang up the telephone.
Watch for this particular scam:
The grandparent scam– This preys on seniors’ love and concern for their grandchildren. It works like this: In a recent report from the FBI in Buffalo, N.Y., a caller contacted an elderly person in western New York state who claimed to be a grandchild who had just been in a serious car accident and arrested for drunk driving. The imposter pressed the grandparent for money to post bond, then passed the phone to someone else who claimed to be the caller’s attorney. Sometimes, instead of the “grandchild” making the phone call, the criminal pretends to be an arresting police officer, lawyer, doctor at a hospital, or some pseudo-authority figure.
Are You Looking for a Premier Waupaca Assisted Living Facility?
At Park Vista–The Legacy at Waupaca, a leading Waupaca memory care facility, our staff is dedicated to ensuring you or your loved one receives the best possible care. We recognize the importance of security and safety for our residents and their families. Our facility and programs are designed around keeping everyone happy, healthy, and safe.
Call us today at (715) 942-0047, or visit our website to fill out a contact form to learn more about what makes us a leading senior living community.