Summertime seems to be a popular time that tourists get scammed. It could be due to the warm weather where tourists take down their guard, having a great time, and not so skeptical. Tourists traveling to unknown countries or places seem to be the target by summer scammers. Tourists should be aware of summer scams.
Look below at a few of the top summer scams that can occur to tourists:
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Vacation Rentals
The vacation rental summer scams happen to tourists a lot. You are searching for a summer vacation rental at the last minute with your local paper and on classified websites online such as Craigslist, and these are not verified websites. You find a vacation rental, but the owner doesn’t accept credit cards for payment, so you don’t hesitate to send a wire transfer. The day of your vacation comes and you arrive to the vacation destination, but nobody shows up to meet you at the property or someone else is staying at the property that you rented or the address that you were given turns out to be a house that is falling down and unsafe or the property is just an empty lot. The renter is spending your money somewhere and you have been scammed.
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Restaurant Scams
You arrive to your summer vacation location and it happens to be very late at night. You are handed a flyer at the airport, in the taxi, or the restaurant flyer has been put under the door of your hotel. You noticed that nothing else is open, so you decide to call the restaurant to have food delivered. You place your order and they tell you that they only accept credit cards, so you give your credit card details over the phone, then wait for your dinner to arrive. You continue to wait, but your dinner never arrives, so you call the restaurant back thinking that they were just busy, but nobody answers the phone. Now, it has been awhile and you have been scammed by a restaurant take away scammed, which was plenty of time for the scammers to make expensive purchases with your credit card.
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Reception Scams
The front desk check-in scam is another summer scam that happens late at night. You finally arrive to your hotel and you check-in, then you go to your room. You are brushing your teeth getting ready to retire for the night when the phone rings. The person on the phone tells you that they are with the front desk and your credit card was declined, so they need the credit card details again, so they can take care of the room charges. You are tired, weary, and just want to sleep, so you give the details of your credit card. You don’t think about it until the next day or you may not think about it again until you get home when you find out that you have been scammed.
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Fake Wi-Fi Network Scams
You may be excited when you arrive to a restaurant, store, or a public area that has free Wi-Fi, but you should take caution, because there are many fake Wi-Fi network scams. You connect to the free Wi-Fi, which is a fake network where scammers gain access to your online banking, email, and credit cards to scam you.
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Cash Drop and Switch Scams
The cash drop and switch scams can occur with a taxi driver or an assistant of a shop. You give a cash payment, then they will exchange the payment that you have made with a lower amount, and this usually occurs on the passenger’s seat of the cab or the counter of the shop. You don’t think anything about it, so you give more money. This occurs often for tourists, but you can avoid this scam. When you pay for anything, then say vocally the amount of cash that you are paying, so you aren’t a victim of this scam.
