More scams target older folks

Nov 08, 2008 (The News & Observer - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) -- FDX | Quote | Chart | News | PowerRating -- Even without decades of experience in international finance, Louis Servizio said, he would have spotted something funny about a recent postcard that told him he had a package waiting.

The green card looked at first like a notice from the post office or FedEx. But Servizio, a Raleigh retiree, hadn't ordered anything, let alone the $50 worth of jewelry that the notice said he had waiting -- if he'd only phone in his credit card number to pay a "storage release fee."

"I may be 87, but I haven't lost all my marbles yet," he said. "How would they know what was in the package?"

Scams against older North Carolinians are showing a marked increase as the economy sours, state consumer-protection officials said. The increase in recent months amounts to a 10 percent rise over typical monthly consumer complaints of about 10,000, said officials of the state Justice Department.

"We are entering one of those cycles that the veteran consumer-protection staffers are quite familiar with," said David Kirkman, assistant attorney general in the Consumer Protection Division of the Justice Department. "Consumer complaints and scams proliferate even more in tough economic times."

A salesman for Consumer Clearinghouse, the Naples, Fla., company that sent the card to Servizio, defended it this week as a legitimate merchandising tool and a means to clear out an overloaded warehouse.

However, Consumer Clearinghouse also works to get customers signed up for buying programs that charge credit cards every month, not to mention a string of additional "offers," a call to the company showed.

State consumer protection officials call the card a scam, meant to hook people into nearly unstoppable monthly purchases of almost worthless trinkets. Across the state, the plunging economy has brought a rise in home-foreclosure and debt-collection scams, as well as increases in false sweepstakes-winning claims and other perennials.

"If you think you won the Spanish or Canadian lottery, I have bad news for you, because there is no such thing," said Caroline Farmer, an assistant attorney general and deputy director of Victims and Citizens Services. "Somebody calls our office every day about these very common scams."

Servizio, a World War II veteran who retired in Raleigh to be closer to a grown son, spent years overseas working for companies, including General Electric and ITT. He smelled a rat when he read the green card that arrived at his Brier Creek area home.

"You have to have one of two of the major credit cards and call them," Servizio said. "It didn't make a lot of sense."

Kirkman said the retiree took the right approach when he received the card.

"Instead of looking to see if something is legitimate, he is looking for signs of illegitimacy," Kirkman said.

A check of Better Business Bureau records for Florida-based Consumer Clearinghouse shows that its parent company, Emerson Direct Inc., has an unsatisfactory record -- a warning sign. Donna White, coordinator of the Victims Assistance Program, a state anti-scam effort, said older people who go for solicitations of this kind fall into three categories:

--Lonely people, sometimes isolated from family and desperate for someone to talk to;

--People with early, undiagnosed dementia; and

--People who get excitement from a gamble, or from getting something for nothing.

"Sometimes by the time they realize they are addicted to something that doesn't exist, they've lost their life savings," said White, with the Division of Aging and Adult Services.

In the end, even experienced international travelers like Servizio aren't completely immune from the wiles of scam artists.

"I'm still trying to prove I didn't buy a set of leather luggage in Buenos Aires and a cashmere sweater in Paris on the same day," he said.

thomas.goldsmith@newsobserver. com or 919-829-8929

To see more of The News & Observer, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.newsobserver.com. Copyright (c) 2008, The News & Observer, Raleigh, N.C. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.

More News:   Market Updates | Stock Alerts | All Trading News | Stock Index