A 78 year old man from Westgate has lost almost £10,000 to phone scammers and is unlikely to receive any refund from his bank.
The man, who has asked not to be named, has been struggling since the death of his son four years ago and the loss of his wife last year.
He uses a computer but is not IT ‘savvy’ and is physically frail as well as suffering the shock of his family losses.
The pensioner had been using his savings to top up his pension so he could pay bills which have become difficult now that his wife’s pension no longer comes into the home.
Phone scam
But cruel scammers tricked the man after calling his landline and saying they were from BT and examining a fault on his line.
A friend who has been trying to help the man deal with bank fraud teams said: “He said he was calling from BT with reference to a fault on his line. He was told that there had been several ‘red flags’ coming up over the past week on his line and the caller asked if he had had any trouble with his phone, like crackling or if the broadband signal was dropping or if his computer was running slow.
“His computer had been running slow for a while but he thought it was just him ‘not clearing it out’, as he put it. Basically, the computer probably fell off the ark and he doesn’t really know what he is doing with it.
“That was the hook the scammers needed. The caller said that he wanted to run some tests and my friend agreed.”
Cruel trick
He was told he had…
