DECATUR, Ala. — It's that time of year when scammers are trying to take your money. One Decatur woman says she's had her own encounter involving someone pretending to be a big cable company; DirecTV.
It starts first with a phone call: "Hi, I'm calling you from AT&T/DirecTV. This call is regarding a 50% discount on your monthly bill."
Mindy Thwing says she's received several calls like this one since July. "Somebody is out there, manipulating individuals' accounts without their password. They have access into DirecTV's individual accounts. That's scary to me," says Thwing.
Thwing says one day she answered a call from someone posing as a DirecTV representative to offer her a deal for a year. "DirectTV wanted to offer to me an opportunity to reduce my cost by 50 percent," she says.
To convince her, he added additional movie channels to her subscription. "When I clicked on them, he took a few seconds and magically those movie channels came on," says Thwing.
Thwing says she had to pay $300 up front. "He said buy a $250 gift card and a $50 card. Well the hair on the back of my neck stood up when I heard that," says Thwing.
Thwing says he told her she had seven hours to get the gift cards, and call someone to read the numbers on the back of the cards. When she didn't, she recieved a text message notifying her that her "services will be interrupted and $1000 penalty charges will be imposed on your account. Kindly call the billing department at 855-716-0473."
"What that was to me was intimidating to say you didn't send in your money," says Thwing.
Thwing says she immediately contacted the Better Business Bureau of North Alabama. The group says they've received several calls like this regarding someone posing as DirecTV.
"The lady I talked to today said they told her they would not - if you are adding or subtracting services it would be on your next bill, - those people would not ask for payment over the phone," says Better Business Bureau of North Alabama, Regional Vice President, Tricia Pruitt.
Pruitt says to look out for methods of payment, including CashApp. "If they ask for payment; wire transfer, gift cards, or cryptocurrencies that's a red flag," added Pruitt.
Another tip is to beware of phone numbers you don't know. In fact, when a reporter with WZDX News called Mindy she didn't answer. If you have an iPhone you can use the "Silence Unknown Callers' feature. But you'd still have to make sure there isn't an important call you'll miss.
Pruitt also says even with Caller I.D., the scammers could make it read that the call is coming from a satellite company.
"If it sounds to good to be true, or it's a really good offer always check with the number you have. Not with the number they've given you on the phone," says Pruitt.
Pruitt also says if you happen to get scammed, call the bank immediately. In one of the DirecTV cases, Pruitt says someone who was a victim of the DirecTV scam had 'DIRECTV show up on their bank statement. "If you're doing something online, credit cards is always the safest way to do it especially with something unknown. You do have more options as far as blocking the charge or contesting it as fraud," says Pruitt.