New Task Force to Fight Scams On Elderly

Lt. Gov. André Bauer announced Thursday the formation of a new Task Force on Senior Fraud, aimed at stopping scam artists who target senior citizens in the state. It's made up of more than 40 state and local agencies, groups and individuals, including police."This is just the envelopes of one month, all that together, one month of what one senior in South Carolina received targeting them," he said.

The state Department of Consumer Affairs received more than 6,000 complaints last year about fraud or attempted fraud, and says there were many more cases that were never reported. At the ceremony on the Statehouse steps announcing the task force, Bauer held up a folder full of papers.

Evelyn Holmes of Chester County is one of the state's seniors who's been targeted, receiving numerous letters telling her she had won thousands of dollars in prizes or lotteries that she never entered. "I know it's a scam so I don't interfere with it. I just tear it up and put it in the trash," she says.

The task force includes a new website, which lists some of the most common scams and what to watch out for. It will also include a Senior-Safe Business Network, a list of businesses that agree to abide by a strict code of conduct and to mediate fairly any disputes with seniors doing business with them.

One of the most common scams targeting the elderly is Medicare discount card scams. The card is available to those on Medicare but not everyone is eligible. Scam artists will call, email or knock on doors trying to sell seniors the card.

Funeral and cemetery scams and prescription drug scams also target the elderly. But the task force's website also lists other scams that can hit anyone, like telemarketing fraud, identity theft and the "Nigerian Letter" fraud. Those letters, usually claiming to be from a government official, offer to share millions of dollars with you by transferring the money to you and your bank account.

The Task Force on Senior Fraud's website is at http://www.aging.sc.gov/scams/.

Bauer had this message for scammers: "You will not be allowed to operate in South Carolina. Our borders are officially closed starting today."

It's a statewide problem. Kathy Barrett, president of the Upstate Better Business Bureau, says, "We get calls daily from seniors that have either been victimized or that are checking on something and hopefully we stop them from being victimized."

But Bauer says it's not just the elderly who should call to report scams or potential scams. He encourages anyone with a parent or grandparent who may have been victimized or been the target of a scam to report it. Call the Department of Consumer Affairs at 1-800- 922-1594 or the Lt. Governor’s Office on Aging at 1-800-868-9095.

"The task force is going to go after, any time they hear a complaint on senior fraud, we're going to have somebody investigate it," Bauer says. "If there's a problem, we're going to let folks know about this business using unscrupulous acts and we're going to go after them with every force of the law we can, whether it's lack of business license, lack of reporting their taxes, breaking the law, whichever angle we can get."