Durban - A car theft syndicate has developed an elaborate but cunning scam to steal cars in South Africa that has car owners inviting them to their homes and handing over their car keys.
According to Tracker - one of the country’s biggest vehicle tracking companies - car thieves are stealing cars by pretending to be from a car tracking company.
In a warning to all its customers on Tuesday, Tracker said that ehicle tracking customers are being contacted by the scamsters who are pretending to work for Tracker.
“They advise the customer that there is something wrong with their tracking device and that they need to come out to repair or replace the device,” the statement said.
“Once on site the perpetrators will claim that they need to test the device by taking the car for a test drive or they will say that they can’t finalise the repairs on site and need to take the vehicle back to the fitment centre”.
Accordnong to Tracker, the scamsters have targeted the customers of several vehicle tracking companies.
The company advised that if you are contacted about repairs to your tracking device by someone claiming to be from Tracker, you should ask them to take you through the Tracker security verification questions associated with your account in order to verify the legitimacy of the call.
If they are unable to do so, advise them that you will need to contact someone at Tracker to verify their claim.
Peopel who are still unsure or find the call suspicious please contact our call centre on 0860 60 50 40.
Tracker said that It is important to keep the following in mind:
A Tracker technician will never need to nor should they ask to test drive your vehicle
Always check the email address the request is sent from – this is often an immediate give away as the criminals would not be using a tracker.co.za address
People can always confirm the validity of an appointment by contacting our call centre on 0860 60 50 40.
Daily News