Carer warns of clairvoyance scam targeting the elderly after her 102-year-old client gave away £48,000 to fraudsters
- Sally Mills told This Morning that her client, 102, lost thousands in the scams
- The carer said how the ‘brainwashing’ scams had the elderly woman fooled
- READ MORE: I’m a relationship expert and these three dating app red flags will stop you being scammed
A carer has slammed ‘brainwashing’ clairvoyance schemes after her 102-year-old client lost more than £48,000 after falling prey to fraudsters.
Sally Mills appeared on the This Morning sofa today where she revealed ‘lonely’ elderly people were being targeted by scammers who were sending them letters through the post, requesting money to be sent overseas.
‘All we had to do was put a stamp on it,’ she said, explaining that the envelope would already be provided by the tricksters.
‘They’re very brutal,’ she added.
After her client handed her a letter to be posted to Austria, alarm bells rang in Sally’s head and she immediately reported it.
The carer had placed the envelope on the passenger seat of her car when it slipped open and revealed that £45 was to be sent abroad.
She immediately became concerned and took the case to her caring agency, who then flagged it with Trading Standards.
‘Over the time my client was giving me more and more envelopes to post and I gave it to my boss,’ she told viewers.
While the elderly woman is now aware something is afoot, she is ‘now 102 and she is still lonely’ – so still struggles to have seen the scam as not having been genuine.
Sally revealed the woman even has a ‘picture’ of one of the scammers next to her bed ‘because he said he loved her’.
Consumer affairs expert and presenter Alexis Conran urged viewers to keep an eye out for elderly and otherwise vulnerable individuals who may be targeted.
‘Clairvoyant scams are when people are posing as spiritual guides,’ he explained.
‘Sometimes they’ll pose as your friends and they’ll offer you all sorts of insights into your life, things that have gone well for you…sometimes they’re as basic as “I will give you the winning lottery numbers to next week’s lottery”.’
Sally Mills told This Morning that a 102-year-old client of hers lost more than £48,000 after falling prey to fraudsters
The carer had placed it on the passenger seat of her car, when the mail slipped open and revealed that £45 was to be sent abroad
Consumer affairs expert and presenter Alexis Conran urged viewers to keep an eye out for elderly and otherwise vulnerable individuals who may be targeted
He revealed the letters could be as long as four to six pages long, making anyone who is in dire need of company desperate to engage.
‘What they’re trying to do is become your friend, become your pen-pal,’ Alexis said.
The scams may range in complexity, but eventually all of them will ask for money in exchange for various deeds, like ‘lifting a curse’.
‘Because this whole thing happens by mail, it happens very slowly,’ he stressed, meaning people may not even realise the magnitude of their spending.
He also said they’ll pose a front by using images of people who ‘look trustworthy’ and may then try to ‘turn you against loved ones’.
It comes as last year, a Daily Mail investigation revealed that Britain is the global capital of fraud, with losses rocketing to almost £3billion a year.
The losses per person in the UK were far higher than in other leading Western economies, including the United States, Canada and Australia.
And the situation is getting worse as criminals exploit the cost of living squeeze to find new ways to con the elderly and vulnerable. This horrific new ‘wave’ of scams led to fraudsters stealing £700million in April 2022, compared with an average of £200million a month over the previous year.
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