Waking up to a phone call from Kingston, Surrey County, Jamaica, is something that I normally would have ignored. Unfortunately (or fortunately, I suppose, since it led to this article), I had only just woken up and my foggy morning brain didn't register that my phone even HAD caller identification, so I picked up the call.

“Hello?” I groggily croaked into the receiver.

“Good morning, sir! My goodness gracious, I am calling to share excellent news with you today!”

My brain began firing as I shook off sleep. It's a telemarketer, I mentally lamented.

“Thank you, but I'm not interested,” I said, rolling over to put my phone back on the nightstand.

“But sir! You have won the Publisher's Clearing House Sweepstakes! Are you certain you aren't interested?”

Oh. It's not a telemarketer. It's a scammer.

Now, a little background, for those younger readers who may not be familiar with Publisher's Clearing House. Back when I was growing up in the late '80's and early '90's, Publisher's Clearing House used to run commercials on television where they gave vast sums of money away to people. T.V. personality Ed McMahon, who used to be co-host for Johnny Carson, was their spokesman, and I'd bet there isn't anyone over the age of 30 who hasn't heard their jingle during every program from Saturday morning cartoons to the evening news.

Now, as a youngster, I once got a letter from the actual Publisher's Clearing House when I was about 12 or 13. No, I hadn't won, and no one was going to show up at the house with balloons and a big check. They were wondering if I wanted to sign up for the Clearing House to buy books or whatever it is they do when they're not giving away life-changing money. I wrote back on my finest Lisa Frank stationary, addressing the letter to Ed McMahon himself, letting him know that, while I appreciated the offer, I was barely a teenager and unable to accept a membership. I entrusted the letter to my mother to mail, so I'm absolutely certain it got sent to him.

All that to say, I'm pretty familiar with Publisher's Clearing House, and I'm pretty sure they're not based in Jamaica. Also pretty sure they're not prone to giving money away to people who aren't signed up.

“Okay, how much are we talking about?” I asked, looking to waste this person's time since they decided to wake me up with this nonsense.

“Oh my gracious, sir! You have been selected to receive 3.5 million dollars and a silver/gray Ford Ranger! Isn't that exciting?!”

“I'm thrilled, really.”
“Most excellent! Now, I need to know if you have some pen and paper that you can get, because I need you to write down my name, Richard Smith, and my employee number, as well as some other information.”

“Sure. I have to go get it, so hang on a sec.”

So I got out of bed and stumbled to the kitchen, poured myself a cup and ambition and yawned and stretched and tried to come to life. It took a good ten minutes or so to “find a pen” while the scammer waited on the phone.

After acquiring a writing implement, the scammer then gave me a bunch of nonsense information to write down. His “name”, employee number, my winner number, and a bunch of other things like the amount of the winnings and type of vehicle, etc. He then assured me that sometime between 1:30 and 2:30 pm., people would be at my house to bestow the imaginary largess upon me. There was just one problem.

“Okay. What's my address?” I asked, because at no point in this phone call had my name or address or any identifying information been mentioned.

“Well, sir, we only have your phone number for now, as it was selected by our system! We will need you to provide some of that information to us!”

How incredibly convenient. And selected by their “system” no less. You know, like a call center.

“I see. And you'll have this to me by 2:30 this afternoon?”
“Of course, sir! My goodness, we'll have it to you by then with your new vehicle and everything!”

“That's certainly going to be a feat, since you're calling from Jamaica.”

A brief pause while he thinks up a lie, or perhaps looks up where my phone number is located.

“Oh, NO, sir, my number is from Jamaica, yes, as you can no doubt tell from my accent! But! We are currently in Little Rock, Arkansas.” He pronounced it Ar-Kansas, which really was an unforgivable sin.

Now, this entire time, I've been waiting for the other shoe to drop, as they say, and for this scammer to ask for money or compensation during this interaction.

“So, sir, as you may well be aware, the IRS is currently taxing large payouts of money like this, yes?”

Yes, I am aware that the IRS taxes large payouts of money. And small payouts of money. And medium payouts of money.

“Absolutely. The government always gets their cut,” I respond, getting a sense that he's about to give his game away.

“You know they do, sir! Fortunately, while the IRS would normally take a large amount of the winnings in taxes, we have some wonderful sponsors here at Publisher's Clearing House who have taken care of most of those taxes. Isn't that wonderful?”
“Truly heartwarming.”

“Yes, sir! My goodness gracious! Now, unfortunately, there is a fee for delivery of the money that will need to be taken care of by you when our people arrive this afternoon. The fee is $1,500, do you think you will be able to do that for the 3.5 million and the Ford Ranger?”

“While I have no doubt that I could, I'll happily just work it out with the IRS. I don't want them coming after me for tax evasion. They're relentless in their thievery, after all.”

“Well, sir, my goodness, I can certainly understand that, but from 3.5 million, they would take (some ludicrous amount) from your winnings! Surely, you don't think that you'd rather them do that than having to pay the delivery fee of $1,500?”

“The $1,500 is definitely less. Can't you all just take it out of my winnings?” Of course they can't, there are no winnings. Even if there were winnings, the IRS is going to take their cut, regardless.

“No, sir! Unfortunately, we will need the fee up front. Now, is there a Dollar General or a Walmart in your area?”

Dude. First of all, of course there is, this is Ar-Kansas.

“Yeah, I have both of those within a few blocks of me. Why?” I asked, already knowing the answer.

“Wonderful, sir! You will need to one of them and pick up three $500 Visa Gift Cards to put the fee on. Are you able to do that now, or do you need a few moments to freshen up first?”

I was laughing inwardly and outwardly at this point. I had to give him credit, as I'd had him on the phone for almost an hour at this point. It may not seem like it from the article, but I cut out a fair piece of the conversation where he was giving me useless information and asking me what I was going to do with my winnings.

“Look, this has been fun and all, but I'm not going to get you any gift cards. That's one of the most common scams in the world.”

“Sir, what do you mean? This is no scam, this is Publisher's Clearing House!”

“Yeah, man. I'm a reporter who recently wrote a piece on scams during the holidays and I routinely watch scam baiting videos in my spare time. Tell you what. When people show up at my house this afternoon, which you still don't have the address of, I'll happily take them over to my bank and give them $1,500.”

At that point, the scammer hung up the call. Maybe it was something I said.

Now that you've gotten down to this point, let me share a few tips for those of you not in the know about these types of scams:

It may seem like a given, but if it seems too good to be true, it probably is.

No one from any legitimate business is going to ask you for a fee in the form of gift cards. Especially not a bank or any government entity.

Don't share your personal information with a stranger either over the phone or internet. It's never a good idea.

An American company is not going to call you from somewhere overseas. Granted, many companies do employ overseas call centers after regular business hours, but if the call is coming from outside the country, be suspicious.

A fairly common tactic these scammers use is to get you to give them access to your personal computer through Team Viewer or some other software that you will need to download. Don't. If you already have, they'll probably show you a Very Intimidating Black Screen that looks like what some people think the “back end of your bank server” looks like. It isn't. They're showing you the Command Prompt for your PC. They'll do this so that you have to type in some arbitrary amount because the bank “sent you too much money” or some other obvious malarkey, that you have to fix for some reason. They'll then input an extra zero into the amount you typed in to try to get you to believe that you somehow made a mistake on your end and now you have taken more money from the bank, which they'll then try to guilt you into sending back to them in the form of gift cards. You owe them nothing, because no funds have changed hands. Alert the fraud department at your bank immediately to protect your account and ignore any subsequent calls from the scammer.

Some of that may seem fairly obvious, but thousands of people fall for these types of scams every year. Protect yourself and your loved ones by being careful in your interactions and staying informed about the latest scams going around both on and off the internet.

For more information, check out the FBI's tips on Scams and Safety at https://www.fbi.gov/scams-and-safety