Retired teacher loses more than RM300,000 in Macau scam

BATU PAHAT: A retired teacher lost RM317,500 after she fell victim to a Macau scam.

In the 10.30am incident last week, the victim, 60, received a call from a man claiming to be a court staff who then connected her to a “policeman”.

Acting Batu Pahat OCPD Supt KS Mender Singh said the woman was told that there were arrears in her credit card payment and that the card had been used by someone to commit crimes.

“They also told her that she was connected to drug smuggling and money laundering activities.

“Believing the scammers, the woman did as she was told and gave details of her bank account as well banked in RM317,500 into another account,” he said in a statement on Tuesday (Sept 11).

Supt Mender said the victim was promised that the money would be returned upon completion of the investigation, which would take less than 30 minutes.

“The woman realised that she was cheated after she did not get back the money after 30 minutes, and she could not call back the phone number,” he said.

The woman then lodged a report at the Batu Pahat police headquarters.

Macau scams often start with a phone call from someone pretending to be an officer from a bank, government agency or debt collector.

The scammer will then claim that the potential victim owes money or has an unpaid fine, often with a very short window of less than an hour to settle the payment, or else they will face “dire consequences”.

These unsuspecting victims will then be asked to make payments to get them off the hook.