Woman getting piles of mail
Posted: 8:25 PM Jan 11
Last Updated: 10:51 PM Jan 11
Reporter: Mike McKnight
NY Business Steals Omaha Address
Identity theft is a common concern, but what if your address was stolen? An Omaha woman is getting unwanted business mail addressed to her home.
"Sometimes I get more mail for the locksmith than I do myself, " says Lois, who doesn't want her last name used. Piles of junk mail for 24-Hour A Locksmith come to her address.
"Why would a reputable company hijack someone's address and use it as their business address unless there was some reason to conceal it?"
24-Hour A Locksmith has a local phone number, but a call goes to a dispatch center on the east coast. "They put the addresses in there so you know that they're nearby and in your area, but there's no store fronts at all there, says a dispatcher.
"I'm trying to find out why that address is being used?" asked Channel 6 News' Mike McKnight. After a Six On Your Side call to 24-Hour A Locksmith for assistance, a local locksmith was dispatched.
"I don't know if it's legal or illegal, I don't know anything about that, " he said. "I have nothing to do with that.
Would he call them and ask why are they doing this? I don't think it's any of my business, that's their problem."
Postal inspector Dave Margritz found 24-Hour A Locksmith on three Internet Yellow Page Web sites. All show the address for the company which we won't reveal because it's Lois' house.
"We're going to contact those three Web sites that I found and demand they take that listing off there because that company is not authorized to use her address, " says Margritz.
Lois worries that one day a disgruntled customer will show up on her doorstep when she's home alone. "I'm not in the phone book, I have an unlisted number. I just have no idea how this locksmith got my address and felt they could use it."
The hijacking of her address by an out-of-state dispatch company for local locksmiths has Lois worried about opening her mail and her door.
The locksmith who responded to our call to the dispatch center says he's an independent contractor working for Dependable Locksmith out of The Bronx, New York.
Channel 6 News left numerous messages with dispatchers asking a manager to call Six On Your Side. No one ever did.
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Comments are posted from viewers like you and do not always reflect the views of this station.
Posted by: Real Locksmith on Jan 12 at 06:28 PM
This lady should call a lawyer and sue this parasite company. A real locksmith up in WA had his address used by them and was firebombed. She should get the police and state att. And even the governor involved. She should contact a real local locksmith or alarm company and get camaras and an alarm installed. This company has been linked to using illegal aliens here on VISAs as workers and they don't care about any US laws. We real licensed (if state required) have been fighting this company and another for years. Seems there are only two "real" companies, one moved to FL and the other is in NJ. One is PricelineLocksmith aka Dependable Locksmith aka to many to list and the other is USALocksmith aka also to many to list.
Posted by: Dean on Jan 12 at 04:51 PM
Time for persons to learn that doing things attracting attention of the Postal Inspectors is "plenty stupid"... True words spoken by a 1930s Chicago high-profile mob guy. He never ventured towards mail activity nonsense, because of the known consequences. Will safeguarding our home addresses go to the point we have to take down our displayed house numerals? One thing none of you want is a trip to the Federal Building downtown.
Posted by: HL on Jan 12 at 10:45 AM
Wasn't this the same company involved in a story not long ago, about a man who got a huge charge from the locksmith?
Posted by: Jo on Jan 12 at 06:54 AM
A while back wasn't there an article about people calling a locksmith and then finding out it wasn't a local number? Maybe it's the same company who decided to get a local bogus address?
Posted by: Keith on Jan 12 at 06:49 AM
Seems not long ago, some guy need a locksmith to get in his car and called a bogus one in NY and paid dearly for it. Sounds like you need to go to the Postal Inspector too.
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