Lady waiting on hospital appointment was almost scammed by HSE imposter

A woman who was waiting on a hospital appointment was contacted this week by a person she believes was impersonating a HSE employee. 

The woman received a call from a man informing her that a date for the medical appointment had been arranged for her daughter at the hospital and worryingly was able to provide the lady with her daughter’s name and date of birth. 

The man then requested a payment of €95. Despite the fact that the caller was extremely convincing, the lady decided to check the matter out further before making any payment. She returned a call to the caller’s number later on the same date to discover that the number was totally unrelated to the HSE.

Fortunately the lady in question had not provided any financial details to the caller. The lady called Milford Garda Station to make them aware of the scam.

Gardaí are asking the members to be aware of this nature of scam. They are urging the public to be wary of cold calls and to always ask the caller their name and for their phone number. Gardaí say if you have any concerns, hang up and ring your bank/service provider, or in the case mentioned, call your hospital using a verified number.

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"Just because the calling number looks like an Irish number doesn’t mean that it is," gardaí say.

They also urge members of the public to never ever give away your personal or financial information, not transfer money and to obtain advice from a trusted person before taking any action. Sophisticated fraudsters are known to use texts, calls and emails to trick members of the public into giving away their personal data, enabling the fraudsters to take over their bank account/devices or debit/credit card details. 

If you have been a victim of a scam, change your passwords/pin codes, report it to your Bank ASAP then report it to gardaí.

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