Ideate

Be careful of VAT refund scam

by Andrew on 01/11/07 at 7:02 am
4 comments

I have just had a phonecall from somone claiming to be from SARS, asking for our bank details so that he can deposit a VAT refund. Being a law-abiding (and slightly authority-fearing) citizen, I started to comply with him. But then a little alarm bell went off. I knew that we weren’t entitled to a VAT refund, and surely SARS already has all of our details? I asked the caller how I could verify his identity, and he said I could call my local SARS office. When I asked more questions he claimed that he was just following orders from "management". I asked to speak to the management, and he said he would put me through, but then the phone went dead, and he hasn’t called back.

I turned to Google for some answers, and soon found this article on Fin24 from over a year ago (clearly the scam is still working). 

My guess is that a cheque would have been deposited into our account. Then we would have got another call saying that a mistake had been made, and we needed to transfer the money back out. Then the original cheque would have bounced.

You have been warned! 

Andrew Smith is the pedantic systems guy behind Live Alchemy, a SA e-commerce company. Andrew writes for Ideate in an attempt to make the world a more efficient place. View more articles by Andrew.

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