Frothers Unite! UK

kind of a new one at work, luckily most people seem clued up - it's the standard type of thing, an alleged tax refund. all laid out correctly it seems on the main page, and the email is well hidden - whomever is doing it does have it showing a direct.gov.uk email address - and unlike normal scam ones where hovering over the email address will show the correct one, this doesn't. There are a few warning bells on the email at first, if you are aware of these things. I am sure you have all seen it, but this seems an update. The text is here;

DIRECT GOV
LOCAL OFFICE No. 158432
TAX CREDIT OFFICER: Joy M Brown
COUNCIL TAX REFUND ID NUMBER: 2234124578 REFUND AMOUNT: 318.23 GBP

Dear Applicant,

Unless expressly authorised by us, any further dissemination or distribution of this email or its attachments is prohibited.

I am sending this email to announce: After the last annual calculation of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund of 318.23 GBP

The dispute follows miscalculations of Pay As You Earn (PAYE) liabilities last year, which DIRECT GOV originally also denied when reported in this space but later admitted affected millions of people. You can now reclaim your over paid tax now by complete the tax return form attached to this message.
After completing the form, please submit the form by clicking the 'Refund Council Tax Now !' button on form and allow us 5-9 business days in order to process it.

Our head office address can be found on our web site at DIRECT GOV

Joy M Brown
DIRECT GOV Credit Office
Preston
COUNCIL TAX REFUND ID: UK2234124578-HMRC

DIRECT GOV denies profiting from tax refund delays which leading accountants claim are becoming more widespread and make taxpayers wait months to get back what they are due.

Copyright 2014, DIRECT GOV UK All rights reserved.

There is also an HTMl attachment, where it asks for all your bank details etc. It stores itself locally and is a PHP form going off to a .Ru address. Playing around with it (I like to at times fill these in with hideous abusive messages), I cannot get it to take a fake credit card number so cannot send off my form full of expletives to them.

Just raising it here in case you know of people who are not so computer literate / know what to look for, are elderly etc. Especially in the economic 'crisis' we are in, there will be some people who believe it.

Er, what part of PAYE is Council Tax?

None.

Also this: 'DIRECT GOV denies profiting from tax refund delays which leading accountants claim are becoming more widespread and make taxpayers wait months to get back what they are due' is highly unlikely to appear on a refund notification - at best that's a press release.

In addition Direct.Gov is a web site, not a government department with tax or benefit responsibilities. And in any case HM Government don't ask for your bank account details by email.

However I know from experience that people do get taken in by these scams and publicising them is extremely useful (cheers Aliensurfer).


The scam emails tend to turn up around key dates - as we've just passed 31/1 and the tax return deadline, there will be a few flying around. See:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/reporting.htm
for some details

The gateway that forwarded this on (ISP) is one in Providence, UTAH, of course, cannot trace easily where the email originated, but the form does try and go to a Russian site, so the American ISP's gateway may not be locked down tight and the Russian's are routing through it, which if the case is quite amusing itself

spam wrote:DIRECT GOV
LOCAL OFFICE No. 158432
TAX CREDIT OFFICER: Joy M Brown
COUNCIL TAX REFUND ID NUMBER: 2234124578 REFUND AMOUNT: 318.23 GBP

Dear Applicant,

Unless expressly authorised by us, any further dissemination or distribution of this email or its attachments is prohibited.

I am sending this email to announce: After the last annual calculation of your fiscal activity we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund of 318.23 GBP

See there is the clue I look for, it is sometimes hard to see unless you know what you are looking for. Like my fucking name since you claim to have contacted me specifically.

Sorry Scott carry on there are still moron's in the world falling for this shit.

Levied Troop wrote:None.

Also this: 'DIRECT GOV denies profiting from tax refund delays which leading accountants claim are becoming more widespread and make taxpayers wait months to get back what they are due' is highly unlikely to appear on a refund notification - at best that's a press release.

In addition Direct.Gov is a web site, not a government department with tax or benefit responsibilities. And in any case HM Government don't ask for your bank account details by email.

However I know from experience that people do get taken in by these scams and publicising them is extremely useful (cheers Aliensurfer).


The scam emails tend to turn up around key dates - as we've just passed 31/1 and the tax return deadline, there will be a few flying around. See:
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/reporting.htm
for some details

Yes. In fact "Direct.Gov" is an ex-website, it has been replaced by this: https://www.gov.uk/
After they spent fucking millions of our tax-payers' money advertising Direct.Gov.

but thats what overpaid senior management are for... changing everything at great cost every few years, so they can use it as an example for promotion.

Of course it resolves to a .ru domain; that stands for Rulers United; just like the .com is for, well if you've seen the Star Trek with the Coms and Yangs you know.

I received a similar tax refund notice from the IRS. It wanted my bank details (yeah right) to process a refund of $439.
Two things wrong with that 1, I never get a refund, I always send them money. And 2, I didn't realise the US tax department was based in indonesia! I've heard of outsourcing but I didn't realise the tax man had done it.

I wouldn't necessarily call them "morons falling for this shit", to a vast majority it just about seems legit. The golden rule never give bank details and suspect anything that asks for them. I reported two paypal scam-mails to paypal last year that were as good as I have ever seen, one asking to resubmit my bank details and another closing my account. My second golden rule is report scam span if people report this sort of material to the company being used that company or organisation jumps into gear pretty quickly to shut the turd munchers down. Finally let your friends and acquaintances know, particularly the ones on Frothers