Financial scams targeting seniors are prevalent and costly. The FBI estimates that seniors lose more than $3 billion each year to fraudsters. Scammers go after seniors because they believe older adults have a significant amount of money sitting In their accounts.

But it’s not just wealthy seniors who are targeted. Low-income older adults are also at risk of financial abuse. And it’s not always strangers who perpetrate these crimes. Over 90% of all reported elder abuse is committed by an older  person’s own family members, most often their adult children, followed by grandchildren, nieces and nephews, and others.

Financial scams often go unreported or can be difficult to prosecute, so they’re considered a “low-risk” crime. However, they’re devastating to many older adults and can leave them in a very vulnerable position with little time to recoup their losses.

Learn how to identify and stop the most prominent scams so you can protect yourself and your loved ones from financial fraud.

1. Government Imposter Scams
Government imposters call unsuspecting victims and pretend to be from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), Social Security Administration, or Medicare. They may say you have unpaid taxes and threaten arrest or deportation If you don’t pay up immediately. Or they may say your Social Security or Medicare benefits are In danger of being cut off If you don’t provide personal Identifying Information.

2. The Grandparent Scam
The grandparent scam is so simple and so devious because it uses one of older adults’ most reliable assets, their hearts.  Scammer will place a call to an older person and say something along the lines of:

“Hi  Grandma, do you know who this is?” When the unsuspecting grandparent guesses the name of the grandchild the scammer most sounds like, the scammer has established a fake identity without having done nay background research. Once “in”, the fake grandchild will ask for money to solve some unexpected financial problem (overdue rent, car repairs, etc.) and will beg the grandparent not to tell anyone. Because scammers as to be paid via gift cards or money transfer, which don’t always require identification to collect, the senior may have no way of seeing that money ever again.

3. Medicare/Health Insurance Scams
Every U.S. citizen or permanent resident over age 65 qualifies for Medicare, so there is rarely any need for a scam artist to research what private health insurance company older people have in order to scam them out of some money. In these types of scams, perpetrators may pose as a Medicare representative to get older people to give them their personal information, or they will provide bogus services for elderly people at makeshift mobile clinics, then bill Medicare and pocket the money. Medicare scams often follow the latest trends in medical research, such as genetic testing fraud and COVID-19 vaccines.

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