I received this report from someone in the insurance business Friday about a Ukash related scam perpetrated on a Australian business:
A shop employee took a call from a man stating he was a technical manager from our phone Epay and UKASH voucher provider stating they will be upgrading our system the next day at 1pm and will this be convenient please confer with the store owner , the person had store owners names which made it more convincing.
The employee was very busy at the time preparing the shop for closure so did not immediately contact the owners. Some ten minutes later this person called back stating they required some vouchers to be printed off in preparation for the upgrade and gave a reference number and asked for nine vouchers of various amounts totalling $1,800 to the printed off and quote the reference number provided earlier.
In the process of doing so the employee became concerned and went to their mobile to call the owner as the caller had tied up the shop phone line. Once owner was informed he immediately went to the store to discover the vouchers had already been cashed even though the caller was still holding on the shop line.
All staff were aware that they are not to sell vouchers over the phone but this person convinced the employee that things were in order stating both owner and managers names along with other technical references.
Fortunately we were able to settle the claim but we believe this is a timely warning to take extreme care.
Please warn all your staff about this. Not all insurance policies would cover the newsagent.