A Burnaby grandmother has been getting her paperwork together to file her taxes for the year, but got some disturbing phone calls on Monday saying that last year’s taxes had been “red-flagged.”
“I went cold because the caller said they were from CRA (Canada Revenue Agency) and I wouldn’t be allowed to file my taxes this year until I had cleared up last year’s taxes,” the senior told the NOW.
The caller told the local senior that he needed more information to confirm her identity so he could go over the tax problems on the phone. The senior told the caller it would take time to get all of her paperwork pulled from her files. The caller said he would call back in an hour.
“That’s when my grandson came over to give me a Valentine’s Day card,” she said. “He could tell I was upset.”
And so the senior explained the situation. The teen knew right away that something smelled funny about the situation. When the person called back, the teen answered the phone and started asking questions to verify that the called was really from the CRA.
“That’s when they hung up,” she said. “I’m so proud of him. The caller was very convincing. It was a close call.”
“Tax scams are amongst the most stubborn cons out there,” says a statement from the Better Business Bureau. “They reappear every year, with a slightly different spin … While Canadians are now much better at identifying and avoiding CRA scam calls, they are unlikely to go away…
