Dundee's Scams Team has taken a joined-up approach to both physically protect and educate the public to protect themselves from scams. This is a growing national issue which particularly affects ageing and potentially more vulnerable communities, with 53% of people over 65 having been targeted by scams. Through working with local partners, Dundee City Council has developed tailored strategies to combat each type of scam, including doorstep crime (e.g. bogus workmen) mass marketing fraud (commonly known as 'junk mail') nuisance telephone calls (including high pressure sale techniques) and online scams (e.g. copycat websites, online dating). The objective is to strengthen and protect communities through direct intervention and education, while the team also supports victims after they have lost savings and helps them to be better protected going forward. The team uses local intelligence, both in-house and from partners such as Police Scotland, and has adopted 'best practice' from other local authorities. The threat posed by scammers is continually changing and the team has adapted to meet these challenges through new communication methods (e.g. social media) and new technology (e.g. video doorbells to protect repeat victims) which are making our communities safer.
The challenge
The issue of scams is growing UK-wide and, with our local community being ageing and therefore potentially more vulnerable, one which dovetails with one of the council's key objectives - to keep our communities safe.
Our Council Plan includes a 'vision' to “…create a community which is healthy, SAFE, confident, EDUCATED…” From our specific service point of view this includes “providing a fair trading environment for consumers and businesses”. One of the ways we do this is to protect people against scams, identifying problem areas (through the use of local intelligence) and developing tailored strategies to combat each type of scam. Scams we deal with include:
- Doorstep crime (including bogus workmen)
- Mass Marketing Fraud (commonly known as 'Junk Mail')
- Nuisance Telephone calls (high pressure sales techniques)
- Online scams (e.g. copycat websites, online dating)
Actions/approach taken
Our overarching objective is to protect local citizens through direct intervention and education. A supplementary objective is to support scam victims after they have lost savings and help them be better protected going forward. We recognise that no one agency is always best placed to do this, so we have developed a `Scams Protocol' to help identify the best agency to assist. This is reviewed annually by partners to `fine tune' processes and include new issues (for example, our latest addition is to signpost people to local vetted agencies which combat loneliness and isolation).
We have used local intelligence, both in-house and from partners such as Police Scotland, to identify scams in their various guises. We have also adopted 'best practice' from other local authorities and have created our own solutions locally e.g. a Trusted Trader/Banking Network and joint awareness raising events with Police Scotland. These local solutions involved the setting up of a network of local banks and post offices (23 institutions) so staff could be trained in identifying potential scam victims and then be able to provide an `early warning' system of potential victims. This scheme has now been mirrored by Police Scotland adopting a national model (The Banking Protocol).
Barriers that required to be overcome were mainly in showing partners that we could appropriately handle intelligence and could be trusted to follow through in our commitments e.g. involvement in joint operations such as Operation Monarda, the national police initiative to tackle doorstep crime. Jointly we participate in `Challenge Squads' to advise local traders working in consumers' homes of their rights in relation to paperwork (cancellation) and quality of work. We also hold advisory surgeries in hospitals and banks. Known scam victims are visited to ensure their continued safety.
The Adult Support and Protection Committee's Financial Harm group was a particularly good vehicle to create close working relationships with partners to ensure we reach our target `market' of the elderly and vulnerable. Officers review (orally) the cases with their line managers to seek areas for improvement. We also follow best practice via the Knowledge Hub (National TS Scams Team). The threat posed by scammers is continually changing, so we have adapted to meet these challenges through the use of new media and new technology (e.g. video doorbells).
Impact and results
Due to the nature of scams, victims are often unaware that the money they are paying is a 'scam' - or, if they are, then they feel foolish and may not want to publicise this fact. As a result, national research tells us that figures are under reported (estimated 5%). However the loss to the UK economy from scams is currently estimated at over £3.5 billion. This makes measuring `impact' very difficult in what is primarily a prevention strategy.
In relation to consumers, we can accurately measure referrals from scam mail victims in the city (via the National Scams Team) and in the last year we have visited 60 consumers with an estimated saving to them going forward of £20,000. We record scam victims with whom we have direct involvement through our intervention work. We can measure, on limited occasions, where we are able to get compensation for the consumer from their banks but in the main scam perpetrators are based overseas and outwith the enforcement powers of both Trading Standards and Police. It is for this reason that the main emphasis of our work in this area relates to prevention.
Tackling scams has a social as well as an economic objective. It is difficult to quantify the non-monetary value our prevention work has in relation to keeping people safe in their own home. The loss of confidence from being scammed can lead to people losing the ability to live independently, resulting in further costs to both them and the local authority.
We measure:
- customer satisfaction of our service users both through the Trusted Trader feedback scheme and online surveys - satisfaction levels with our service are high, with 82% of service users saying they were `very satisfied' with their contact with the service.
- the number of written warnings we issue to offending traders and reports to the Procurator Fiscal - 12 written warnings and 2 reports to PF in the past year.
- talks that we do to groups of potentially vulnerable consumers - 7 in the past year, but these have a much wider `reach' because participants share the message with friends and neighbours.
Our use of social media and the empowerment of `partner agencies' as message carriers is hard to quantify but definitely has an impact. It would be fair to assume that we deliver more than we set out to do by the multiplication effect of sharing best practice with other agencies locally in schemes such as “Friends Against Scams”.
Personal feedback from scam victims has been very rewarding. One 84 year old man told us: “I felt that I received no help from the banks when it was discovered that I had been scammed. I didn't know who to turn to. When Trading Standards intervened they helped protect me from further scam attempts by installing a call blocker. They also went through my financial records and helped me reclaim £8,000 that had been paid to scammers. They continue to support me and I know that I can call on them at any time for further advice and assistance. What an invaluable service.” DF
How is the approach being sustained?
Local partnership working with the police identified that there was a pressing need to teach officers how to deal with scam victims until a uniform national strategy could be developed. We created `Scams Champions' in each policing area who act as `experts' in scams and cascade best practice to other police officers. This idea has been recognised as `best practice' and is to be rolled out across Policing D Division (Tayside). These initiatives, combined with our strategic joint operational meeting with police, provide a structured way to deal with scams.
The Adult Support & Protection Committee's Financial Harm sub group also provides a perfect forum to further spread the scam prevention message with many other partners within the council, NHS and the Third Sector. We recently have adopted the `Friends Against Scams' campaign which looks to measure people who have undergone an online training package to help them protect themselves and their clients. Measurement of this was done by creating a unique website to monitor participation: https://www.friendsagainstscams.org.uk/elearning/Dundee. Currently, 122 people have undertaken the training with a target of 500 for the year. This project will tackle an issue with scams in that currently only around 5% of victims report a scam attempt.
Lessons learned
Innovative ways in which we meet the various challenges of scams are summarised below:
- Doorstep crime and bogus workmen - Action: Joint operations targeting offenders. Participation in national co-ordinated intervention projects. Enforcement action. Trusted Trader Scheme to provide a safe/secure directory of local `trusted' tradesmen. 'No Cold Caller' stickers- potential criminal consequences for traders who disobey. Video doorbells to protect repeat vulnerable victims.
- Mass marketing fraud/junk mail - Action: Partnership with the National Trading Standards Scams Team (based in Surrey) to identify potential victims in Dundee. Involving the return of money potentially lost and advice to protect. Visits can also uncover other issues with these victims that can be raised with other agencies where appropriate. Work with and training local Royal Mail staff to identify potential victims and advise accordingly. Creation of `Mail Marshalls' to monitor mail. Promotion of `Think Jessica' campaign.
- Nuisance telephone calls - Action: Create advice sheet for consumers to buy/loan call blocking technology to keep them safe from calls from fraudsters. Interrogation of scam callers to assist national identification of scammers.
- Online/internet safety - Action: Promotion of `Stay Safe Online' guidance.
- Helping other organisations - Action: The Banking Protocol, ensuring local banks were aware of the signs of frauds being perpetrated on local clients. This is now a national partnership between Police and Trading Standards.
Dundee City Council supports the national “Friends Against Scams” campaign that seeks to educate consumers https://www.friendsagainstscams.org.uk/elearning/Dundee. This is highlighted via our website and with partner agencies. Our partners have a greater understanding of Trading Standards functions and importantly we also understand their remit better, increasing `signposting'.
Next steps
At this year's review it has been decided to create a Dundee wide database of groups who directly interact with the public. This will be useful to send messages to our target market (the elderly) and can also be used to share other partner's messages with people who may not, as yet, have caught up with the digital revolution.
For further information on this case study, please contact
Raymond Lynch
raymond.lynch@dundeecity.gov.uk
01382 436265).