Help Your Loved One Avoid Financial Scams

The team at Qualicare wants you to understand the risk of your loved one being scammed. Unfortunately, Americans who are age 65 and older are more likely to be targeted by fraudsters and more likely to lose money once targeted. As a result, it’s important to take steps to help protect older adults.

Beware of Scammers

Let’s talk about two scams that often target the senior population.

You Have Won!

Chances are you’ve received this phone call or email yourself, where you have won this amazing award. You know—the one where you have to give out a ton of personal information before you can be given the prize.

Talk through this scenario with your entire family, including older loved ones. Remind them that you don’t win things without entering a contest in the first place. And when you do win, you won’t be asked to provide someone with personal details over the phone.

Help Out a Charity

Our loved ones want to be able to help out as much as they can. However, this is where the bad apples come into play and ruin it for everyone. Some scammers prey on the elderly and their desire to help by calling and asking for donations to a charity that either doesn’t exist—or that they’re unaffiliated with.

You’re probably already talking with your senior loved ones about their finances. Talk specifically about charity giving, and help your loved one decide, on an annual basis, which charities to donate to. Then make those donations together.

Remind your loved ones that most actual charities do not call to solicit donations. If they receive a call asking for a donation and are interested in the charity, have them tell the person calling that they’ll call back later. Then you can check to see if there’s validity behind the request.

Could your loved one benefit from having some additional hands on deck? Give Qualicare a call to learn how we can help.