Scam awareness training

David Bradshaw, owner of Home Instead Rochdale

Training is being given to protect the elderly and vulnerable people from scams which come through the postal system and criminals who contact them through the internet and telephone.

Think Jessica and Home Instead has delivered scam awareness training to many local community groups, the most recent workshops took place at Trinity Church with a Fellowship Group.

The National Trading Standards Scams team estimate postal scams could be netting criminals worldwide up to £10 billion a year

Criminals worldwide are hunting down the most fragile members of our society by “working” from mailing lists which categorise people as being elderly or vulnerable in some way.

The workshops provide tips and advice to educate individuals on how to protect themselves from falling victim to this abuse.

Home Instead has also put together a free ‘Senior Fraud Protection Kit’ which contains information on the most common scams, tools to help assess the risk of an elderly loved one, plus really useful checklists to help seniors take practical action to lower the risk of becoming a victim of a scam.

David Bradshaw, owner of Home Instead Rochdale said: “The faceless criminals who use email, telephone, and post to lure their victims into parting with their life savings, personal banking information and other assets, often prey in particular on the elderly who they see as easy targets for their crimes.

"These types of scams defraud individuals in the UK of an estimated £3.5 billion each year and have very serious consequences for the elderly who can suffer devastating emotional distress plus loss of confidence and trust which can lead to a loss of independence. The sad thing is that much of this could be avoided with better awareness and education."