Watch out for the HMRC lawsuit telephone scam

If you’ve received a phone call from someone claiming to be from the UK’s HMRC threatening a lawsuit, you’re more than likely in the crosshairs of a scammer.

The HMRC (Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs) is the government entity that deals with – amongst other things – tax collection and is the US equivalent to the Internet Revenue Service (IRS.)

At the start of the year, when the online self-assessment tax deadline of January 31st nears, scams relating to the HMRC rise. Usually this is in the guise of emails, but from last year we’ve seen a rise in complaints where criminals have actually called their victims on the phone, posing as the HMRC.

The scammers pose as HMRC officials and inform the victim over the phone that the HMRC are filing a lawsuit against them. Usually this is a pre-recorded message that implores the victim to press 1 to “speak to a case officer”.

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Victims can then be pressured into making payments to the criminals, or can have sensitive information stolen from them, making them vulnerable to identity fraud. Additionally criminals can request victims call premium rate numbers that charge extortionate amounts per minute.

The advice to avoid these scams is simple, since the HMRC do not make calls to threaten lawsuits. So if you do receive such a call, hang up the phone. We should always be sceptical when receiving unexpected or threatening calls over the phone and it is important not to just assume the person over the other end of the line is who they say they are.

If you’re in doubt, hang up and call the official line of the entity in question. In this case you can get the HMRC helpline from their website.