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By Gates Guarin

Police service warn of increased scams and frauds during holiday season

Dec 16, 2022 | 11:31 AM

MEDICINE HAT, AB – Christmas is just over a week away, but police are warning residents of scams and frauds which tend to increase during this time of year.

Sgt. Adam Gregory of the community support unit with the Medicine Hat police service says with the amount of purchases over the holidays, more people are taking advantage of those who are spending their hard earned money.

“At Christmas time, we all feel a little bit more stressed; there’s lots going on, we’re doing lots of things with our money that we earned and we’re buying gifts and we’re going out and we’re spending,” Gregory says. “So the risk of identity fraud increases as well.”

In addition to identity fraud, police are identifying gift card scams as the most common, with weekly and sometimes daily occurrences here in Medicine Hat. Scammers will reach out to victims to provide payments with gift cards. Codes are given to the scammer, and the money is lost.

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Other forms of frauds and scams include overpayment of cheques, where the victim is given an overpayment and is asked to return the excess and then the cheque then bounces or cannot be processed, and down payments on buy and sell sites such as Kijiji only for the ad or poster to disappear.

Gregory says while police will look into these matters if they are reported, the chances of a successful investigation are quite slim if the money has already been sent. The biggest piece of advice Gregory is giving Hatters is to recognize no legitimate business or government agency will ever ask for payment through gift card codes or cryptocurrency.

“We need to be vigilant and really be questioning of when people are coming or anyone’s reaching out to us for our money,” Gregory says. “If you’re in doubt, don’t act on it, don’t send our money away, don’t give our personal information out, and even if we believe it could be real, then let’s reach out to family or friends or contact the non-emergency number at the police service and ask us and get some help to determine if we’re about to be a victim of fraud or not.”

Gregory adds while these scams have continued throughout the year, the frequency of these scams and frauds so far during the Christmas season have been lower than previous years.

Parcel Thefts and Safety

The Medicine Hat police service are also warning of increased package thefts during the holidays.

The risk of theft jumps up and the frequency of package purchases increases during the Christmas season. Gregory says the trend of parcel thefts are lower as compared to other years, but says to not lower your guard.

Gregory suggests a few ways to keep your packages safe:

• Redirect parcels to other physical addresses or to another person
• Request a signature upon delivery
• Look into curbside or in-store pickup
• Look into installing delivery boxes or doorbell cameras to deter would-be thieves