Seniors learn how to recognize scammers

After working for a long time to secure stable finances for retirement, the last thing one wants to do is lose all those savings to a scammer.

During the month of June, the Golden Hour Senior Center hosted presentations to focus around Elder Abuse Awareness month.

One of the presentations came from Trona Valley Federal Credit Union representatives who focused on making sure seniors are financially aware by recognizing scammers, resisting the scam and then reporting the scam to proper authorities.

The most common forms of senior scams involve senior exploitation, which is when a friend or family member takes financial advantage of the senior, or fraud, which is usually done by a stranger.

"The senior community is definitely vulnerable," Trona Valley employee Steffany Arellano said.

Often times, seniors are too trusting, they have money and they are willing to take financial risks.

"When you're 20 or 30 years old you have a lot of debt," Arellano said.

Seniors, however, have most of their money in accounts, which makes them targets. Plus, the senior population is increasing. In fact, 10,000 people in the United States turn 65 every day.

Some of the most common scams that target seniors include callers who pretend to be their grandchildren who are in jail and need bail money, or the IRS calling to collect payments or someone claiming the senior has won the lottery, but they need to send money to another country to collect it.

Kaylee Straw, Trona Valley employee, said no one ever has to send money in to claim a lottery prize and no one will ever need a person's social security number.

Denise Welch, Trona Valley employee, said scammers are getting smarter and they are known to target seniors at their most vulnerable times -- after their spouse has died. Barbara Bates, GHSC activities and marketing manager, said some scammers look through obituaries to find out information about the person and then they make the scam call. They will know the names of their children, grandchildren and where they live and use it to fool seniors out of money. If that doesn't work, they will simply Google the person's name until they find out enough information about them to complete a scam.

Welch said be leery of the phone numbers. Just this past year, a call came into her from the Green River Police Department's number telling her they were going to arrest her, if she didn't pay. She hung up the phone and called the local police department, it wasn't them. Scammers like to use local numbers to make the call seem legit. Whenever in doubt, simply hang up and call the number back. More than likely it wasn't that agency at all, it was someone just making sure the local number popped up on the caller ID.

Arellano said it's not just scammers seniors need to watch out for, but family and friends who are overly interested in their finances. Some family members will try and get the senior to change the will or make them power of attorney. This should always be a red flag for a senior.

"If something doesn't feel right, it's probably not," Arellano said.

If a senior does get scammed, it's important for them to report it even if they are embarrassed so others won't fall for the same scam.

Bates said she no longer uses her debit card because a couple of years ago she and her husband had their bank account completely drained by someone who got the number.

The Trona Valley reps encouraged seniors to use their credit cards or their debit card as a credit card so that won't happen to them. A credit card has a limit, but debit cards are directly linked to a bank account. With the new chip cards, debit cards should be safer.

Welch said pay attention to bank and credit card accounts. Check them frequently to make sure they balance with the checkbook or credit-card purchases. Look for small $1 or $2 purchases.

"They are fishing. They are trying to see if it works," Welch said.

If the $1 purchase goes through, they start purchasing more expensive items.

"The more you watch your finances, the more you catch," Welch said.