Beware Fake 'winning telephone call'

SamanthaKirwan

Hi just thought I'd post as I have just had a phonecall claiming to be from 'Elite UK' it is a 0203 number and I have actually traced it to a company also calling themselves 'Elite Lotto syndicate'. The caller sounder south African and immediately raised my suspicion by telling me he was calling me to inform me I was 'a finalist for a 1000 pound primark voucher'. I thought it odd that I would get a call if I was just a finalist and not the actual winner, so I waited for the catch. He then read out to me my address and my email address - He has obviously got my info from a comp entered online, though I always tick the boxes requesting the info not be shared! . He then said 'now I am sure with coming up to christmas you'd like some extra money for your family, so I am going to give you the opportunity to invest in the euromillions lottery and I just laughed and said what? And then he said 'I can offer you guarrentied winnings every month'. At which point I laughed again. He then asked me twice in a row do you play the lottery? I said No twice, and the line went dead. I searched the number online and have come across lots of people saying theyve had similar calls and this is infact a scam to get your bank details. Thankfully I wasnt stupid enough to give mine over, but I am worried sick now about the information this guy already holds on me. I also think its terrible that an elderly person or someone more gullible could have their bank account wiped out by this. I dont know what to do next so thought I'd post on here to warn others. Whole thing makes me feel like giving up comping tbh.:(

SamanthaKirwan

I have reported the number to Action Fraud. If anyone else has a similar experience please contact Action Fraud via their website or by telephone. Very sad that these guys carry out these scams on potentially vulnerable people.

mjm3346

The compers chat corner has several posts about this type of thing, one of the recent ones

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/5308787


and there is a thread for competiton "scams" here

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/173789

captainjack2

This is a popular scam and there is a woman and man who does the calling. I have had calls to say I have reached quarter finals, semi and finals before for an iPad, iPhone. They call from a number of different numbers.

SamanthaKirwan

Amazing they are still getting away with it , from the number of people posting about similar contact with this crowd, on here and all over the net.
Anyway, I have reported them and would encourage others to do the same, I kinda hope also that by naming and shaming these people online it may prevent someone, somewhere from having their bank account wiped out by these fraudsters.
I apologise for posting in the wrong section of the forum, as it concerned the scammers stating it was a 'winning phone call' I thought it probably appropriate to post here. Now I am aware of the proper part of the forum to talk about such things,for future reference, though I hope not to have contact with the likes of 'Elite UK' again.

mjm3346

Doesn't really matter being posted in iwiwiw, just pointing out it's sadly not uncommon.

They tend to be very misleading but not necessarily illegal - some (most?) buy tickets, pass winnings on and they can guarantee a "win" if they go down that route.

What they fail to mention and try to hide is how much of the money you pay them actually gets spent on tickets, I have seen over 90% taken for "running costs" but none of the ones I have seen ever state how much they take. Some claim nothing is taken from your winnings, while true this ignores that they have already taken out 80% of what you paid them in the first place.
Guaranteeing a win on Thunderball is easy - just buy 14 tickets with a different thunderball on each - Euromillions requires a bit of number arrangement but it does not take many more tickets to be certain of a "match 2" prize although £2.70 split between everyone in a syndicate will be just a few pence each

Duchess747

I've come across this company to do with either Eye Lift by Aimee and trueeyeallure.com. They took £180 out of my friends bank account when she signed up for a free offer. They are scam merchants and being investigated!