PayPoint has made a renewed warning to retailers not to process a PayPoint payment transaction over the phone in a bid to put a stock to fraud involving Ukash, the service that allows shoppers to use banknotes and coins to pay or send money on the internet.
Retailers have reported receiving bogus phone calls from fraudsters posing as PayPoint employees, and in response the company has added two new buttons to the Ukash transaction process so the retailer has to first confirm that the customer is in the shop and, secondly, respond to the question “STOP. IS THIS A TELEPHONE CALL?”
Pressing the button to say the customer is not in the shop or that the transaction is during a telephone call automatically terminates the transaction.
Techniques used to defraud retailers include bogus callers saying that the terminal will be suspended if the retailer doesn’t perform a Ukash transaction; that the activity is to update software and make the terminal faster; and that the store needs to receive a refund.
In a training information sheet, retailers have been told: “Please do not be fooled by these unscrupulous fraudsters. In a lot of cases, the caller introduces themselves and asks the member of staff to press a sequence of buttons that lead to a Ukash transaction. Paypoint will never ask you to do this.”
PayPoint has also stressed that if voucher information is given over the phone, the retailer will become liable for the transaction and will be debited accordingly.
In the event of receiving a suspicious call, retailers and their staff should hang up and immediately call PayPoint on 08457 600633.
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