I got the phone call (on my cell) from Advantage America this morning, and for the most part it was identical to all the other complaints here. I will say right off the bat that my situation was only a rip-off attempt, these people did not get my bank information from me. However, if a prosecutor for these creeps need testimony I will be happy to assist.
The first call came from a man with an extremely heavy Indian accent. He claimed I was eligible for a $12,500 government grant for always paying my taxes and my *cell phone* bill on time. That was my first clue, since my cell phone bill isn't in MY name. Well, that and the fact the US Government couldn't care less about my cell phone bill. He asked me to confirm my name, and my address, which he had wrong but I let it slide for the moment. I knew I was being scammed and I wanted more info.
He went on to explain that the government was going to issue me $12500 in 24 hours. Wow! What efficiency! All I needed to do was give them my checking account number and bank name, and they'd call back with my verification number and by tomorrow I could do whatever I wanted with that money. At this point I corrected my address and told them to send me documentation, since I wasn't giving bank information out over the phone.
He kept insisting this was legitimate, that I would have a free grant from the US government that I would never have to pay back, and if I was sitting at a computer (which I was) I could check grants. Gov (a legitimate US government site btw) and see this was for real. I asked what grant program he was talking about and he wouldn't give me a name so I hung up.
He called back and kept asking for the bank information and again I told him, if this is legitimate they can send me documentation at my home address, and hung up.
10 minutes later I got a call back, from a woman this time, "Valerie Hall", another person with an extremely heavy Indian accent. She explained that I would get the money, blah blah, but they had to do this complicated verification process with the bank and I had to give them all of my checking info first to get a verification number. I told her to just send me a check. She said that checks can get lost or stolen and the Government Grant program would only issue funds this way so they could be sure the right person was getting the money. I told her the US Tax department issues me a tax refund check every year with no concern as to whether it gets lost in the mail or not. At this point I was fed up, I got their address and phone number (which was not correct) and hung up.
They said to be calling from Florida but the first few calls showed as a Texas (210) area code on my cell phone, so who knows. Regardless, they didn't manage to get any useful info from me, but I really do want to see this "company" nailed to the wall.
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