Don’t Fall For This Amazon Scam – Here’s What Happened to Me!
Amazon scams are definitely on the rise.
As unemployment numbers soared over the past year due to the coronavirus pandemic, it seems that phone and online scams have also been on the rise including identity theft, virtual credit card skimming, and more. According to the FTC, Americans have lost over $382 million to fraud linked to COVID-19 since last year when the pandemic started. in addition to the millions of dollars that are scammed every day related to online shopping, credit cards, and phony IRS bills.
Y’all might want to grab a cup of coffee ☕️ and maybe even a snack 🍿 because my story is going to be kind of long, but I think it’s important to know these Amazon scams are out there.
Here’s how I dealt with an Amazon imposter:
I received an email that appeared to be legit at first glance, but it wasn’t… it was in fact a total scam. I thought I’d share my experience with you and give a few tips on what to look for in order to keep your information safe and to avoid being scammed.
I received an email “from Amazon” that stated a Sony PlayStation had been shipped to an address in California. Oddly enough, I knew the exact area as I used to live in a neighboring city. My first thought was, “oh man, someone has hacked my Amazon account and I should call.” Luckily this “official” email had all of the information I needed in order to take care of it. 🙄
🚫Red Flag #1: At a closer glance, I noticed that the email originated from a Gmail account instead of from @Amazon.com.
Amazon order emails typically come from <auto-confirm@amazon.com>, and definitely NOT a Gmail account!
🚫Red Flag #2: “If you did not place this order” is never in the verbiage that Amazon uses when sending out shipment notifications.
This has never shown up on ANY of my previous Amazon order details… something seemed very off about this!
🚫Red Flag #3: Oh look! There’s a handy dandy phone number for me to call about my fraudulent order.
Wait a minute, Amazon will never mention in their emails that you should call them if you didn’t place an order. There isn’t even a phone number included in the emails that they send. I think I’ve called them maybe once in the 20+ years I’ve been a customer (and it took forever to find the number to call). This is a definite way to be able to tell if it’s an Amazon scam.
In fact, Amazon doesn’t want you to call, it’s much easier (and faster) for them to handle your issues via their online customer support chat.
🚫Red Flag #4: Currently, Amazon emails do not include the full address in the shipment confirmation email, only the city, and state.
The fraudulent email has the entire address right there so that the recipient will see it and instantly think OMG I didn’t place that order, leading you to possibly call their fraudulent hotline. Total Amazon scam.
🚫Red Flag #5: Weird formatting.
As you can see from my screencap, Amazon shipment emails are currently formatted with this box set up with concise information about your purchase. The fraudulent email contains just way too much information. They want you to react based on the email alone and NOT go to your Amazon account.
I shop on Amazon almost every day (so much so that I may need an intervention), so from the look of the fraud email it seems they have mimicked the cart page from Amazon and not the shipment email, nice try scammers.
So what did I do knowing this was an Amazon scam?
I like to get to the bottom of things and these scammers make me so angry, so I decided to call their “Amazon Hotline”. When my call was finally answered, it was a computer-sounding voice.
After pressing 1 to speak to someone, the phone rang several times. I imagined a random dude on the other end, sitting there in a tank top and boxers eating Funyuns and drinking a PBR waiting for someone to call.
Finally, a guy answered and even threw in the pleasantries of asking me how I was doing and thanking me for being a valued Amazon shopper for two years. Hold up, I haven’t given you any information, my caller ID is blocked but you know how many years I’ve been shopping? Nice try pal, I’ve been with Amazon for decades, but whatever. 🙄
He then asked me for my order number and I replied with 123456-7892020, asked my name and I told him Julia Roberts (go big or go home, right?!). He asked for my email and I replied with fauxreal@amazon.com. He clearly could not have cared what I said, because even with the fake email, fake name, and fake order number, he was magically able to pull up “my” PlayStation order.
He then said, “your order is due to arrive by Friday, did you place this order or was this someone else making a fraudulent purchase with your account?” Wow, I’m not sure I’ve ever been asked that by any customer service rep I’ve ever spoken with from any company.
I played along and said, “OMG I did not place that order! Please cancel it, whatever shall I do?” My sarcasm was clearly lost on “Pete from Amazon”. Luckily “Pete” was super helpful and gave me the name of a website (not Amazon) that I need to go to and enter my payment information to update it.
Sadly, he told me that my Amazon account would need to be locked for two days while they investigate. But don’t worry, once we have your updated payment information we can start the process to reinstate your account. Listen here “Pete”, I need access to my account pronto, I don’t wanna miss any great Amazon deals, so I’m gonna need to be able to place orders today.
“Pete” was also so helpful and was going to give me information on how to change my Amazon password – but on a different portal than Amazon. Man, the help never ends with this guy, shout out to “Amazon” for hiring such a stellar employee! I was trying to keep him on the phone as long as I could because I knew every minute I had him distracted was another minute someone else might not be scammed. I was working so I just kept typing away while he carried on with wanting me to give him info.
After a while, I had enough and I informed “Pete” that I knew he was a scammer and he needed to stop. He acted heartbroken that I would think that and kept asking me “what do you mean a scam?”.
In my best I need to speak to the manager voice, I gave “Pete” a few choice (but clean) words and told him to stop scamming people. Sadly, “Pete” hung up on me. Dang, maybe I should call Jake from State Farm so I’ll have someone to talk to. 😀
On further research, it seems that the same phone number has also been tied to a social security scam, the website I found even had the audio sample from the phone call. I’ve gotten those before and played along, giving fake numbers, and even kept one on the phone for over an hour while I was working. He assured me that I was going to jail if I didn’t comply with his instructions. 🤣🙄
Oddly enough, as I was writing this post, I received a phone call from “Pete from Amazon”, he even gave me his (faux) Amazon employee ID. He wanted to call and follow up on my call yesterday and find out if I’m ok and if I still need the information on how to change my payment information. Nah man, I’m good, you’re a scammer. Once again I broke his heart and he hung up on me. I’m guessing blocking my caller ID didn’t work.
So friends, please be extra vigilant when you suspect an email or phone call is one of these scammers.
Also, speak with senior citizens that are friends or family about these type of scams. Many times they prey on older people who may not know that it is a scam. A friend of mine was recently telling me how her elderly mother-in-law was scammed out of $1500 in gift cards and the hacker even gained control of her computer remotely. 🙁
Here are a few ways to protect yourself from online/phone scams:
- Slow down. It’s natural to panic when you receive a phone call or email that leads you to believe your information has been compromised. Give yourself a little time to do your research and to check your account to see if unauthorized purchases have been made.
- Don’t respond to texts, emails, or calls about checks from the government.
- Hang up on robocalls. Scammers are using illegal robocalls to pitch everything from low-priced health insurance to work-at-home schemes.
- Check the official FTC website and read through some of the current imposter scams and educate yourself on what to look for.
- When in doubt ask friends online. I’ve seen many people ask about weird calls or emails via posting on Facebook. You’ll quickly find that many of your friends have possibly received the same email as well.
- Pay it forward by reporting scams. One helpful reader mentioned forwarding any suspicious emails to the Amazon fraud department at stop-spoofing@amazon.com and spoof@paypal.com for PayPal fakes.
Stay safe friends!
These are crazy times we are living in, I hope that this information was helpful and will possibly prevent you from being a victim of an Amazon scam.
Stay informed! Check out the latest information on data breaches, recalls, product launches, store closures, and more!
Thank you for this valuable information 😘
Sorry this happened to you:(. I guess I’m skeptical by nature because I never believe most emails i receive that claim I have money somewhere or an item shipped that I know I didn’t order. If it’s something that looks halfway legitimate I go straight to my account, whichever one it happens to be, and take it from there. I never click through emails as I guess I feel they are all scams lol. I will remain skeptical as it has kept me from falling into scams. I notice I receive a lot of scam Apple emails telling me all kinds of things about my account. I basically almost laugh at them now but i worry that others will click these emails maybe not being as skeptical as I am. Thanks for this article as I feel it is highly needed.
Yeah I’m always skeptical as well, nothing bad happened because I didn’t fall for it, but I worry about those who aren’t as in the know about these scams.
Well I wasn’t so lucky I fell for the Amazon scam . Had to cancel my bank accounts and change everything what a mess to clean up yes I lost money But at least I got it back I am an older citizen of 72 and wow was I stupid but I did learn some did learn something. Thank you my girlfriend sent me this article after the fact
I get the ones from”Apple” all the time too. At first I was worried because they looked legit but I never did anything with them and then eventually realized it was scam
I try to send the all Apple ones to the fraud department. I get so many scam emails these days. I mostly worry about the elderly because I feel they are the most susceptible to it. My mom had her phone hacked recently. She is very new to smartphones & internet. Luckily I have a relative who works in cyber security who was able to straighten it out for her. Also be aware of scam calls. I rarely answer any call besides a relative. Recently a worry are the ones who do the SIM card swapping scam. So I now have a google number to use for banking etc. If you don’t know about the SIM card swapping scam you should look it up.
I get the ones from Apple too. I play along and give fake info like account # and all that.I give them hope. Then again. do not have an apple account. 🙂
Sadly this has happened to me twice in the past year. Once thru Amazon and just recently thru PayPal. I had to go to the bank and get all new debit/checking accts. It;s a total pain as I have automatic bill pay for most everything. People are so ruthless and I just find it horrible in times such as these that their are still people out there taking advantage of others when we’re all struggling. Kudos to you for doing your homework and posting. Bless you!
Oh gosh Susan, I’m so sorry that happened to you! I once sent a check to someone via Priority Mail and it was stolen and fake checks were made in various states. I had to close my bank account I had for 20 years and start over with a new one. Once they have your account and routing number there’s nothing you can do. Luckily with a credit card they can shut if off.
I’ve had this happen multiple times with Apple. I go to the web site (not the link in the email) and verify that I haven’t purchased anything recently.
I’ve gotten a couple of apple scam emails lately. They look so real.
Unfortunately I have another story to add to this. I got an email that says I know your password is xxxxxxxx and at least part of that password was something I used before and it said that if I wanted to keep them quiet I would have to pay them $1,900.. Several of my family work in IT, and computers and told me that this is a scamming technique that’s used pretty frequently and a lot of people do pay them. It’s disgusting to me that people would do this so now I’ve had to change passwords, and shut down emails Etc. So disheartening.
Oh gosh, I’ve heard about this scam as well. Apparently my email and some old passwords are on the dark web so I try and change my password often.
Yes, that just happened to my sister last week. They had an old password of hers, some correct but old personal info, demanded money and threatened to blackmail her with evidence that she used a porn site. She knew it was a scammer but because they had an old password it was unnerving.
I had the exact same thing happen to me last week. Luckily, I knew I hadn’t been to any “adult” sites so I knew it was a scam but you’re correct, it was unnerving!
I”m getting this one also. Too bad we don’t have a personal home computer with a camera attached. LOL!!! I”m also getting the ones about my prime membership being declined because I need to update my info. Nice try buddies.
OH! I’ve gotten those lately. Some say that they have incriminating information on me including videos…I almost want to see what that could possibly be, haha. My life is boring, so I won’t fall for that one.
I got that email too! Do I need to change all my passwords? I just ignored it.
You should definitely stop using that password. It’s information from an account that was hacked and it’s on the dark web. That’s how all those Disney+ accounts we hacked months ago. It’s because people were still using the same old email and password. I’ve had my email and amazon account hacked that way.
I got a similar email from PayPal. I sent it right along to their fraud department. It looked legit besides the few spelling errors….
Me too ! Twice in the same week !
YES! The scammers love to spoof Paypal emails and they alllllmost look legit!
Hmmmm….seems like Pete’s email address may be a good one to use when needing an email address to sign up for things where we don’t actually want to share are email 😝 thanks for sharing this info! It’s a good reminder that scams are more prevalent with all that’s going on.
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Interesting that the scammers were able to unblock your caller ID. Did you dial *67 before dialing?
I have an iphone so I turned off the thing that shows my caller ID. Maybe it flipped back on?
Maybe try using a Google voice number next time? I do this when I call companies who I don’t want having my number.
There’s a lot of companies that can unblock it now.
You can get an app that will unblock the number. I had to do that when I was having someone call me at all hours of the night with their number blocked.
I really appreciate that you took the time and effort to make this post. I am a regular Amazon shopper as well and could have likely been in your shoes. This is at the very least a helpful reminder to verify the emails we receive and I again appreciate it, thank you thank you!
Aww you’re welcome! Sad that we have to second guess our emails like this!
I got this exact same email! I was concerned at first but went right to my Amazon account order history and saw that there was no such order so I ignored it. Thanks so much for sharing your experience. It’s absolutely terrible how people try to take advantage of others!
I get tons of amazon scam emails! I recently got one similar to this. I was upset for a second, but quickly realized how fishy the whole thing was. I just delete them now, but it is super frustrating.
Thanks for the reminder. I had a similar email yesterday too. I deleted it too but it did make me stop and read it before I thought oh this is a scam.
Glad you mentioned the part about playing along and keeping them on the phone for as long as possible. Hubby always does this for the same reason you said, to keep someone else from getting a call and falling for it. Towards the end of the call, the scammer either comes clean about what he is doing and why or he gets mad at his time wasted and begins to exchange curse words. My advice would be to stay vigilant and always look at sender email addresses and go to the actual website, never click a link from an email.
It would be more effective to report them than to keep them on the line.
Actually, I’ve tried that and they don’t care. I was actually told they don’t bother following up on most of the reports because “it’s someone in another country there’s not much we can do.” So I also keep them on the line as long as possible giving them all kinds of false info to waste their time.
Sorry this happened to you!
One of the first red flags in these types of emails though should be the punctuation and grammar though.
I would HOPE an official email would have those things. 🙈
As I say though twice. 🤣
Amazon has a post about reporting Suspicious E-mails, Phone Calls, or Webpages. Don’t know what they do with the information, but may help to report it.
Here is the link https://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=201909130
Awesome! I’ll add that to the post!
I had a strange Amazon fraud happen this month too!!! For some reason, all of my Amazon emails keep going to my junk folder, and are opened…but not by me! I finally see that I’ve been charged $50 from Amazon, and know that I didn’t place a $50 flat purchase. Instead, it was an installment plan payment, for a Kindle Paperwhite. Not only had the paperwhite been purchased from my account, but the “thief” had also also filed an exchange on it already, and hadn’t sent in the replacement for the exchanged item. So…the thief received TWO Paperwhites, and I would be charged for the second one at the end of the month, if it the original wasn’t turned in!!! We are STILL trying to figure it all out, 2 weeks later! When I went in to my Amazon orders, neither I or the representative could find the order for the Paperwhite…and then…the rep remembered a trick that hackers sometimes use. They archive the order so it isn’t obvious. There is a section that you can find all archived orders, and sure enough there was the shiny Paperwhite purchase! (Who knew that was there?) Currently, we will be out close to $550, if they don’t figure out how to get it all taken care of. Of course, there are fewer workers, so it makes it harder to get anything done as well.
Perhaps Amazon should fix that feature so you (or scammers) can’t archive recent orders!
But then how would I ever order gifts for my husband from amazon! 😱
Oh…. I didn’t know it was used for that!!!!
We have Prime and each have our own accounts.
Tia, Do you pay for two prime accounts for your household?
No, you add them as a household member but they have to have their own account.
Anne, Check your email account. A couple years ago, when my email account was hacked, the hacker had set my email to forward to a random email address (theirs, obviously), so that I wouldn’t see the orders they’d placed on my amazon and Costco accounts and related updates. I learned this while on the phone with my internet provider after a couple hours on the phone with amazon and Costco. (The person helping me asked if there was another email I would use for forwarding. When I said “no”, she told me where to look in my webmail account, and sure enough, my emails were set to forward.) If only these “smart” people would use their talents for good rather than evil!!
Can’t you file a fraud claim with your credit card or debit card company/bank? I thought there is 100% protection for online fraud (and any unauthorized use).
Why should you be out anything. Report this fraud to your credit card company right away.
Thank you for this vital information!
I never check most emails now bcus of this, it’s too easy to scam people nowadays. If it’s urgent, and you suspect somethings wrong, it’s easy enough to just go to the website directly to check the order status etc. I’ve been scammed before so now I just don’t even crack open the door to allow them in, bcus that’s all that they look for, a crack in the door, and then they’re in 🤨
A year or two ago, I was driving my son to a tutoring session on a Saturday morning around 9AM when I received a call while I was driving. At first, I didn’t want to answer the call as I was driving, but not sure what happened that day, I answered and had it on speaker phone. A man than said he had my brother and the only way they would release my brother is if I send them money via western union NOW! It I tried to hang up or say anything to anyone they would ‘kill’ him. I was on speaker phone and my little one was in the car overheard and started crying. The man started yelling I told you not to talk to anyone or say anything who are you talking to you want your brother to die?1?! I told him I was driving and my son was in the car and that I was on speakerphone. He told me not to put on speaker phone and not to try anything. I pulled over and i had another phone and i texted my niece. I asked her where is your father? She replied he is sleeping. I asked are you sure? In the meantime the man is asking what are you doing why are you so quiet?!?! I answered. I’m driving and looking for a western union. My niece sends me a photo of my brother sleeping so I hung up. I told my niece what happened so after I hung up my brother called and I told him what happened and the guy called again so I did a threeway calling without the guy knowing. He screamed I’m trying to help you and your brother! why did you hang up! Want us to shoot him?!?! my brother answered Just shoot me then! Shoot me! the guy hung up! .. I was so scared the first minute when he told me he had my brother! The world is crazy and what they try to do to scam people. Be safe everyone and take care!
That is SO horrible!! I’m so sorry!! About a year ago, my 98 year old grandma called me all in a panic and crying saying that my brother had called her and said that he got in an accident, killed a little boy, and is in jail now and needs money. My poor grandma was SO upset, for my brother and for the little boy. In her panic, she accidentally hung up on him, and then called me wondering what to do and how to help, thankfully. At first her emotion had me wrapped up thinking it was true, but my grandmother lives in Canada and I know my brother would call me or my parents before he would call her. Nothing about it made sense, but I was so mad at those strangers for doing that to her.
Oh wow! That must have been so scary! I’m glad your brother is ok! That would have freaked me out for sure!
This is terrible! I listened to a really good intense podcast about something similar on Small Town Dicks. Those types of calls are terrifying.
If you get a suspicious email, dont click on anything. Call Amazon and you can forward the email to their fraud department. Immidiately change you password, again, open a new browser, then go straight to Amazon, and I would also enable two step verification. If someone tries to login, you need to enter a code that is sent via text message or phone call (you cannot change the number on the sly) as well as the password. It can be a hassle but its worth the extra layer of security. Also, if someone DOES login, all the CC’s are encrypted even you cannot see any full account numbers even on your own account.
I got a scammer “Amazon” email this morning. It looked different from yours though. Thank you for sharing this story, so that others can be aware!
I have also received emails from “Amazon” in the past week. Thank you for writing this article. Very helpful!
I get these weekly from “PayPal”. Even when I all but closed my paypal account and had no payment method stored. Big eye roll. Turns out all they had was my email address. They come from hundreds of different emails so it’s basically impossible to block them but most of them ends up in my junk folder and if they do come through, I report them to the fraud department. I really wish these people would get a real job.
I got one this morning from “PAYPAL”
I panicked and almost clicked the link but then decided to double check. I was able to forward to actual PayPal, flagged as fraudulent. The email stated my address had been changed in my account. Please be careful and yes, slow down.
Thanks for the great info!
Thanks for the post. Keep in mind that there are scammer companies that hire innocent people who don’t know they are in the business of scamming! Also, I was recently looped in with some colleagues from work, me asking for their money. And, one of my friends actually bought $500 worth of gift cards for “me!” The scammers got a hold of our cell phone numbers and emails, used our relationships to each other and claimed a “new number” or “new email” that was similar to our real ones. My other colleagues thought to check with me in real life but the one, she wanted to help “my kids in this desperate time.” She was stressed that day and thought I was being b***hy but thought I was also truly in despair. I don’t know how this originated but the scammers were smart and knew enough. She did file a police complaint, but it was the 5th one in the day (in the Phoenix area). Be careful! Check in with friends or people by voice or in real life!!!!
I get e-mails from (supposed)’ups’ all the time stating they are trying to deliver a package.
I’m an IT Technician, so I know the signs of scams. To follow along with this post, please DO NOT do those questionnaire games on Facebook! You know the ones that ask about your favorite color, where you lived, what high school you went to? More often than not, these are questions that can be used as security questions for resetting passwords. It’s in all good fun, but if the wrong person knows what to look for, things can get pretty ugly! Just a warning! Stay safe online, too!
Yes! People are doing so many of those, I haven’t luckily! That’s great advice Jos!
Just got a bogus text from Netflix (we don’t have Netflix)…
FRM:NetflixCustomer
MSG:NetflixCustomer Support team recommends you to update your payment data: https://netflix-cs.cc?unsee=poydladlhxp
Yeh, right!!! LOL!
Thank you for this important reminder and to always be on the lookout for these unscrupulous scammers.
Oh my heck! Thank you for the warning, Bunny!
Thank you sooo much for this post to help protect us during this terrible time in our lives
You are welcome, Susan! Stay safe!
Thank you for all the information. Really loved the line about talking to Jake from State Farm. LOL
I got one from chase last week. Just deleted it since I know their call times are ridiculous right now, if I wanted to report it that way.
I have had tons of Amazon emails telling me that I needed to update my credit card information for my prime membership or they were going to cancel it. Today I had one from the Apple about my purchasing Netflix premium through an app. I love that there are so many misspellings in the entire email that I can’t believe anyone would actually fall for this. Just take a minute and do not download or go through any links with the suspect email. Best thing to do is to delete the emails after telling your system it is spam. And then go directly to your account (Amazon etc) and look at your account. These Amazon emails have increased greatly in the last several weeks.
Angela your little asides are very funny. Thank you.
Aww thanks!
This is so funny! good job on scamming the scammers.
Thank you! Gotta keep them occupied so at least they aren’t on the phone with someone who might not realize it’s a scam!
just got that very one in my e-mail today…Thanks for the heads up…it helped to remind me to just press “spam” and move on…
Ive gotten alot of amazon order emails recently…I just delete them once I check my account to make sure no ones hacked my account. Its crazy
I get an email several times a month telling me they had to lock my account because something was wrong or concern it was hacked etc. I delete it – May amazon account it through a completely different email address LOL
Nicely done! Although I am pretty savvy to this stuff, it was so cool to see how it played out from reading your article. Helpful and entertaining! 🙂
Thank you for posting. Also, emails that claim to be official, but have misspellings or grammatical errors are a dead giveaway.
You can forward the fake Amazon email to their fraud department at stop-spoofing@amazon.com. PayPal fakes should get forwarded to spoof@paypal.com. If the suspect email is from some other Company XYZ, google “Report phishing to Company XYZ”, and you can find the exact address to send it to. If we do nothing, the situation will certainly not improve. (Not saying it will improve by forwarding these emails to the appropriate fraud department, but I’m sure that businesses would appreciate knowing how (and that) the bad guys are not letting up, so the real company can monitor that case, and make efforts hopefully to improve their security.
I get emails from Amazon, Paypal, Ebay every now and then. They use the email that is not connected to my Amazon account, etc. I don’t even open them, I just forward them to each company’s fraud division.
Amazon and PayPal both want you to report the fraud by forwarding the email to “spoof@amazon.com” or paypal, so they can do their own investigations
It wasn’t amazon but they got me. I’m not sure what i had done wrong but I’m sure i was fooled by an email. I spent 2 weeks calling and changing passwords on all my accounts and now i do the 2 factor when logging in. It’s a big pain for sure, but it’s all stopped finally..
I was bored one day so I answered the call from Apple I Cloud about my account ( I’m a lifelong Samsung girl ). Every time they asked me questions, I answered in Spanish! It went on for a while, I actually felt bad after a few minutes – not! After a while they got nasty, but I kept answering in Spanish. Eventually I ended the call and the calls from Apple I Cloud mysteriously stopped.
😂 that’s awesome!! I’ve done the same before.
I received an email for a purchase from Apple. I never ordered anything from Apple. I started to click then remembered it might leave me open to being hacked so I deleted the email.
If you have the domain of the website where they wanted you to change your info, we could report it to the website hosting company and the domain registration service. Email me if you need help.
If I had received all the gift cards I had “won” from various places – Walmart, Amazon, Walgreens, etc… I’d be a millionaire! Thanks for the reminder!
I’m getting text messages from Amazon to click on the link to ensure shipment of my order. Ummm – any Amazon order I can go into my account. Scam.
Me and my hubby used a friend that many of our friends were using that claimed to be a cpa. She was a very religious and well known lady in the community so we finally used her to do our taxes 2 years in a row. Come to find out she was lying on everyone’s taxes to get them great refunds. So the actual IRS sent us a letter saying we owed them $10,000 back! I almost died! And it was legit. But during the process of us seeking counsel from our original CPA firm and a lawyer we started getting calls from the “IRS” telling us we had to pay back money or we would go to jail or have our home and cars taken from us. It was so ironic that the scammers started calling us when we were having a legit issue with the IRS. We never sent any money or gave any info over the phone. Thankfully I had the sense to tell them to send me everything in writing that I wasn’t comfortable giving out info over the phone. And I was getting statements from the IRS at the time. It went on for over 6 months with the harassing calls and voicemails. This was when scammers had first started with the IRS scam. But I didn’t even tell the cpa or the lawyer about the calls. I did show them all the statements I got from the legit IRS. I finally mentioned to a cousin what was going on and we hadn’t even told our parents. She told me it was a scam and happened to her about a year earlier. So then I had the nerve to ask our cpa and they confirmed that the IRS NEVER makes phone calls! I suffered and almost had a nervous breakdown because the scammers just happened to start harassing us at the perfect timing when we were having legit issues with the IRS! The entire thing still seems crazy to me. In the end the friend that pretended to be a cpa ended up on America’s most wanted for a year along with her husband before turning themselves in. I can’t remember how many years they have to serve in prison but they are still serving their sentence. And because the IRS was able to prove it wasn’t any fault of the people like us who trusted her we thankfully didn’t have to pay back a dime. To this day I still can’t believe the timing fell so perfectly. Makes me wonder if some of the scammers might be on the inside too. 🤷♀️