I recently received a phone call from a man with an accent claiming that I had been one of 20,000 people in Pennsylvania selected to receive a $12,500 grant from the government. This person told me that since I paid my taxes and was over 18 years old I would be able to receive the grant.
After explaining to me that out conversation was being recorded for governmental purposes he went on to ask me a few questions. He began by asking me if I had a middle name, so I told him my middle name. Then he asked what bank I went through and I learily told him the name of the bank, from which he was able to find my routing number for my checking account.
He told me to write down all of his information so that I would have it "just in case." I had a hard time understanding him but I wrote down the address as he spelled it to me. Then he said that he just needed my checking account number and I would be able to go to the three way teleconference to receive my identification number.
At this point I was becoming a bit skeptical about the whole issue and I asked him if he would be able to mail me this information so that I would be able to read over it because I did not feel comfortable giving such a number over the phone. He told me that it was too much for the government to send out this information to all 20,000 people, but I did not believe him.
He could tell that I was beginning to think the entire thing was a scam so he tried to convince me that no one could do anything with my routing number and checking account number. He used the sinerio that if I were to write a $500 check out to someone, they would not be able to get into my account and take out $1000, which sort of made sense.
He kept trying to get the checking account number out of me and I got so frustrated that I just told him I would appreciate if he could e-mail me this information and I hung up. Less than 15 seconds later he called me back and asked me why I hung up. He tried to explain the entire thing to me again and how he was part of the government and in order to get this free money he would need my checking account number. He tried to make me feel bad by asking me why I would not want this refund for paying my taxes from the government.
In an attempt to get rid of him I finally told him that I did not have my checking account number on me at the time and I had somewhere that I had to be shortly. He agreeded to call me back at around the same time the next day.
That evening I search the internet for Advantage America and found a similar usacomplaints.com. I decided that it was definitely a scam and the next day I told him I was not interested and hung up the phone.
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