A 52-year-old Eureka woman lost $3,727.65 when a job she accepted with an Australian data entry company turned out to be fake. The woman contacted police about the scam on Jan. 4, after her bank told her the checks she had received from the alleged company had bounced, Eureka Police reported.
The woman told police she found an ad for the data entry position through Facebook on Dec. 19. She said she had a Dec. 22 virtual interview with a man posing as a company representative, and he offered her the job, according to the report.
After the woman accepted the job, the man asked her to provide her account information so the company could reimburse her for office equipment she needed to purchase for the job. The woman said she thought $2,500 had been deposited into her account, and she planned to use some of the money to cover the $1,007 worth of equipment she purchased with her credit card, the report said.
The man who hired her for the job then asked her to purchase Apple and Mastercard gift cards and said the company would reimburse her for those purchases as well. She made four trips to Walmart and spent $2,720.65 on the gift cards and sent him pictures of the cards, the report said.
After the woman had purchased the office equipment and gift cards, she was notified by her bank that her checks had bounced and her account had to be closed. It was discovered that the $2,500 never had been deposited into her account, Eureka Police reported.
As of Jan. 14, the man who had said he was hiring the woman for a job had not been identified, and the woman’s money had not been recovered, Lt. Michael Werges said.
Eureka Police have turned over the investigation to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, Werges said.
He also said Eureka Police have not received reports of similar scams, and the department is unaware if other police departments have received similar reports.