Republic Bank warns customers about scams during holidays

Once again, Republic Bank Guyana Limited has alerted its customers of possible phone scams during this time of the year.
Communications and Public Relations Specialist Rachael Singh told Guyana Times on Wednesday that scams were heightened during the Christmas season and as a result, the banking institution was sending an early warning to alert its customers and consumers in general.
“It’s a message we sent out to alert everyone and not because of anything in particular… It’s something to let our customers continue to be on the alert, because we know how the Christmas season is.”
Via SMS (Short Messaging Service), the Bank advised the public not to divulge any information regarding their bank cards or PIN numbers over the phone since this is not part of any current activities of the institution.
It also asked persons to “beware of phone scams”, which demand private information possibly with the intention to steal.
Cellphone scams have been on the rise for the holiday season, with fraudsters posing as representatives of various organisations to extract monies from people. So far, complaints have been made about these persons asking for personal information, claiming that the persons called would have won promotions.
To appear legitimate, they would ask for correct names, addresses and national identification (ID) or bank numbers.
In one instance, the First Lady, Sandra Granger had urged citizens to remain vigilant after someone used the name of her office and her name to approach people with the proposition of making down payments for scholarships.
In April, a fraudster, Muhammad Ali was arrested and placed before the courts for impersonating the First Lady and tricking citizens into transferring money to him.
The trickster managed to obtain 12 pennyweights of gold worth $139,000 and $30,000 in GTT and Digicel phone cards, while pretending that he was in a position to grant scholarships to a young woman.