27 - Scamnesty bins at borough venues

 

The Office of Fair Trading’s scams awareness month, known as Scamnesty, runs from February 1 to 26.

 

As part of the campaign Dudley Council’s trading standards team is asking people to drop any scam mailings they have received into scamnesty bins located across the borough.

 

The bins will be located at Dudley, Brierley Hill, Halesowen, Stourbridge and Sedgley libraries as well as the Age Concern office in Bird Cage Walk, Dudley and the WRVS office in Carlisle Hall, Stourbridge.

 

Trading standards officers will also be based at the Merry Hill Shopping Centre on February 17 to raise awareness of the campaign and giving people an opportunity to hand over details of scams.

 

Scams can also be reported online via a virtual scamnesty bin at www.consumerdirect.gov.uk/scamnesty. The Consumer Direct website includes a search facility to enable people to locate their nearest bin.

 

“People across the borough should take this opportunity in the coming month to hand over any scam mailings they think they have received. Our trading standards officers work hard throughout the year to chase up complaints and campaigns such as this can only help put a stop to these scams.”

 

Scamnesty 2008 and 2009 events brought in over 20,000 scam mailings.  The mailings help provide intelligence to assist the OFT's investigations.  The top five mass marketed scam mailings in the UK are deceptive sweepstakes; misleading prize draws, fake clairvoyants/psychics, bogus foreign lotteries and miracle health cures.