Just received a call on my mobile – a number not in my phone which I answered to the following recorded message…
“…this is HMRC. You are accused of tax avoidance and evasion. This is important. Do not ignore this message. You must respond. Call us back on this…”
Obviously, a scam by contemptible people and frightening that it probably works. Because they only need to contact the right sort of person, someone old, vulnerable or naive and you can see money being transferred.
So I called the number… and a real person answered – “Hello, HMRC…”
Proving its a scam because anyone who has ever needed to call HMRC will know that it takes approximately an hour to negotiate through the robots and speak to an actual person.
I explained to the man that I have reported his number to the police – to which he replied in his broken English – ‘Go fuck yourself’ and then he hung up. No doubt, he has other calls coming through?
Here is his number – 0161 – 818 – 6596
Anyone with time on your hands, feeling a little scurrilous and sick of people taking advantage of the vulnerable, give them a call to block up their lines.
And if the police read this blog (doubtful) – you know what to do – and if HMRC read this blog (hope not)…
Reference to hmrc, they also never phone, always write and normally on a Friday so you can panic all weekend!!
At least in my experience.
Exact same scam has been running in the US, people (still with broken English) claiming to be the IRS. And like Charles commented, they send certified post not voicemail. There’s posts on YouTube of people calling them back and just trolling the hell out of these people, some are really funny.