You may want to warn older relatives about this if you haven’t heard about it before. My 89-year-old mother got one of these calls yesterday. The caller claims to be your grandchild, and says he’s in trouble with the police and needs money. Now, my mother knows about this scam, and even had a friend who fell for it, but she still didn’t immediately realize it was a scam. First, she thought it might be somebody who had a wrong number, and then thought it might be her grandson pulling a prank on her. Finally, she realized it was a scam and hung up. The scammer never got to the part about asking for money, which will be in the form of a money order or gift cards.
Some of the callers may already know a grandchild’s name, or may get it from the victim by saying, “It’s me, your grandson,” prompting the victim to say, “Irving?” “Yes, it’s Irving.”
This is common in my area - I’ve received them myself when mine kids were still in middle school.
My nonagenarian mom called a month or so ago. She was so proud and had to relate her conversation with her scammer. She’d played along with him, he wanted money for a broken nose. The scammer thought all was well until Grandma asked him why he needed the money sent to the Caribbean when Grandson lives in Asia - no quick answer, lots of stammer, hang up.
Very pleased that my mom is still so sharp, but I agree scamming vulnerable older folks concerned for their grandchildren is despicable.
I’m glad she caught it. Sounds like she’s pretty sharp… people much younger fall for this scam all the time. We purchased a whitelist call blocker for my mom’s phone when it became clear that she was vulnerable to these things.
My 90 year mom has gotten two of them and figured it out very quickly because each time the caller couldn’t come up with the right name. We “kids” have changed her phone to one that she can block calls and see who is calling.
@momofthreeboys – I wish my mother had been so alert… she fell for that scam hook, line and sinker a few years ago. Despite being warned by my step-dad and sister that they just didn’t believe my daughter was in a Montreal jail and needed to be bailed out, but too embarrassed to call me (her mom.)
“There was just no stopping your mother,” my step-dad later told me, resigned. In the end, it cost my mom $2,000 before she realized she’d been had. Luckily these are not financially strapped folks… but man, what a lesson learned…
I think my mom knows too that the boys would not be afraid to call H or I if heaven forbid they were in jail or trouble so that helps too. She would probably tell the caller they should call their mother lol.
My MIL got a call saying oldest grandson (my oldest child) was in jail in NJ. She asked to speak to him and when she said you don’t sound like Bob (using a different name, as she wisely did), he said, they beat me up and my nose is broken. She told them to call back in 5 minutes so she could call someone to take her to the bank. Then, she called H and demanded to know where her oldest grandson was. H said, he is right next to me in the boat, we are fishing. MIL insisted on speaking to him! Funny, they never called back…
I once got a text that a friend of mine was marooned in England after having been robbed while on vacation. It was really funny because at that moment, H and I were having dinner in a restaurant with that friend and his wife.
My dad is the kids’ only living grandparent. Dad has a lot of grandchildren. He knows about this scam and received a call once and didn’t fall for it. (I think it was obviously “off” as the caller didn’t use the nickname that the kid goes by, and grandpa knew where the kid was at the time–not in the place the scammer said). I can’t picture my dad giving money to any grandkid in trouble, anyway. I think my dad would say, “Tough luck kid. You got yourself into trouble, you can get yourself out!” That’s the attitude he always had.
@atomom - I love it! My mom also would have considered this the Grandkid’s problem, or maybe something for the parents to be involved in, but not her as Grandmom. I bet this is a reaction that scammers don’t expect!
We gave my mother a “safe word” that she could request from the grandchild to know whether it was a real issue. Just like we did when the kid was little; if someone said that Mommy was hurt and told that person to pick her up from school or wherever, the kid had to ask for the safe word to prove the stranger was legit.
Two of my closest friends had this happen to their parents. Both sets of grandparents (two different families) fell for the scam. One grandparent lost $5000 and the other more than $10,000.
In both cases, they felt so touched that their grandkid trusted them that they were eager to help. The same emotions convinced them to keep the whole situation from the parents (the scammers really play on the emotions – “please don’t tell mom and dad. They’ll be so angry at me. I know I can trust you.”)
Obviously, my friends were dumbfounded that their bright, well-educated parents fell for this. One exclaimed to her father, “But you know John Jr. doesn’t have a drivers license and doesn’t own a car! How could you believe that his car was totaled in a car crash!”
In the second case, the grandparent was so eager to help that the scammer called him back two or three more times, which is why the amount lost was so high.
These grandparents were all once very savvy, with high-level management jobs. It really is scary what age can do, and that’s what the scammers prey on.
My mother has stopped answering her phone. We leave messages and she calls back. She started getting spoofed phone calls that looked like they were coming from her own number. Then she started getting spoofed phone calls that were from some of OUR numbers! Somehow her phone records must have been hacked and the spoofer was using some of the most frequently called numbers from her records. We could go the safe word route, but just saying “Hey, it’s so and so, call back” has been working. She usually can’t get to the phone that quickly anyway, so now she doesn’t feel pressure to get up too quickly.
Even if your parents can handle them now, these scams aren’t going away any time soon. If mom gets one of these calls in six months or a year, she may not remember what you’ve talked about. Been down that long, sad road.
Some things that you can do now are to get your parents to change the settings on their bank accounts so that they’re unable to withdraw more than $500 a day without speaking to someone at the bank. Maybe switch to low limit credit cards too. I assume investment accounts can be set up with similar precautions.
My mother was scammed by one of these people a few years ago, pretending to be my S. Luckily, she called me to get his number, called him–and he answered for once!–and she found out he was fine. Then she called me, and I–after saying you did WHAT?!?–swung into action long distance, and managed to get both of the entities from which she had wired money to cancel/hold the transactions until she could get back to them to cancel. I think the total was about $3-5K. Luckily, she lost nothing in the end. The fact that she was willing to help him and wouldn’t give him up, even to me, was very touching.
After that, we established a code word for all of us and S’s godfather in case one of us really does need funds in some strange situation.
This reminds me. I should find out if she remembers it. I don’t think she’d fall for the scam again, but she does have a grandchildren who are likely to be traveling to Africa, Canada, etc.
My Aunt fell for this scam. Emptied out her bank account to take cash to western union. Luckily the woman at western union refused to send the money saying this sounded like a scam. I’m sure it wasnt easy sticking to that with an hysterical angry grandma demanding that she send the money.
We told all grandparents that the grandkids would NOT be calling them for help. They would call parents, aunts, friends - anyone and would not be coming to them for help.
My mom got one of these a couple of years ago - she knew it was fake when the caller said “this is your grandson.” She knew my kids would have identified by name.
My father in New York City just called me two days ago, saying he was disconnected from talking with S1 (who was in bed sleeping). The scammer had hung up on my father after he told scammer he had no money or credit card to help bail him out. My father was a bit leery but still thought it could have been S1. My father is fairly young (73) and no signs of dementia, just very trusting and has no clue that scams like this are in existence. Ugh, so glad he called me, and that he has no money!
