{"id":54505,"date":"2022-11-15T13:51:42","date_gmt":"2022-11-15T21:51:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=54505"},"modified":"2022-11-15T13:51:42","modified_gmt":"2022-11-15T21:51:42","slug":"ftc-battles-highway-robbery-in-indian-country","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=54505","title":{"rendered":"FTC Battles Highway Robbery in Indian Country"},"content":{"rendered":"
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By<\/span>Mark Hedin<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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\"Scam<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Determined to spread the word about scams in Indian Country, the Federal Trade Commission honored American Indian and Native Alaskan month by hosting a\u00a0Nov. 10 online news briefing<\/a>\u00a0for Native American media focused on how to spot and avoid consumer fraud.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday, I want you to know that it is a priority at the FTC to reach out to Native American communities. We want to connect with you. We want to hear from you and we\u2019d love to work with you,\u201d said Monica Vaca, associate director in the FTC\u2019s Bureau of Consumer Protection.<\/p>\n

Impostors and other scam artists racked up at least $6.1 billion in ripoffs last year, just in the 2.9 million cases that got reported, she said.<\/p>\n

The top scam right now is the \u201cimpostor scam,\u201d where crooks pretend they\u2019re with the IRS, or another government agency or a retailer, pretending to help people from being ripped off. Although the median loss in the 2.9 million cases the FTC agents described was $500, Vaca said, in $2.4 billion worth of impostor scams, the damage per case was twice as much.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a lot of money to lose,\u201d Vaca said. \u201cSo we want people to be on the lookout for some of the scams that come along.\u201d<\/p>\n

Besides shutting down bad actors, Vaca said, the agency tries to get people\u2019s money back when it can.<\/p>\n

She described the FTC battle with Tate\u2019s Auto Group, operating just outside the Navajo Nation in Arizona and New Mexico, that would alter buyers\u2019 financial documents.<\/p>\n

\u201cBuying a car is one of the biggest purchases that consumers make,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s incredibly necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n

So buyers willingly share how much they make, how much they can pay, and so on, and in this case, were pressured to sign documents they hadn\u2019t even had time to read.<\/p>\n

The FTC wound up getting $450,000 for 3,500 people who financed cars that were later repossessed. And they put the auto dealers out of business, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cInformation is power,\u201d said Joannie Wei, assistant director of the FTC\u2019s Midwest Region in Chicago. \u201cWe need to talk, talk, talk and keep talking about these scams.\u201d<\/p>\n

Criminals will often ask you for personal information \u2014 social security numbers, bank accounts and such \u2014 that you shouldn\u2019t share.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust don\u2019t give your personal or financial information in response to a request that you didn\u2019t expect. You have to guard this information aggressively and be suspicious.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also, beware if you\u2019re asked to pay with gift cards \u2014 \u201cthat is 100% a scam,\u201d Wei said. \u201cDo not ever pay somebody with gift cards, cryptocurrency or a money transfer service like Moneygram or Western Union.\u201d<\/p>\n

Scammers try to use those payment systems because it protects their anonymity, making it harder to recoup losses once they\u2019re discovered, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe second thing is to resist pressure to act immediately. Scammers are always going to tell you that you have to do it right now. They want to create this urgency, so you act without thinking. That is a huge red flag.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe last piece of advice,\u201d she said, \u201cis just stop and talk to somebody, even just one person you trust, before you give over your money or your information. Just pause for a minute and tell one person about it. Chances are, this moment of pause will make all the difference and help you avoid being scammed.\u201d<\/p>\n

She also recommended the consumer alerts the FTC posts about new scams on its website\u00a0ftc.gov\/consumeralerts<\/a>. Another FTC page,\u00a0Pass It On<\/a>, is geared especially toward older consumers. And there\u2019s more general financial information and advice posted in English and Spanish at\u00a0consumer.gov<\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you think you\u2019ve been scammed, you can\u00a0alert the FTC<\/a>\u00a0at\u00a0https:\/\/reportfraud.ftc.gov\/#\/<\/a>. For those wary of the government, Vaca said, the reporting form allows people to provide \u201cas much or as little information as they want.\u201d<\/p>\n

Appearing at the press briefing with Vaca and Wei were lawyer Michael Elliott, of the Flagstaff, AZ, DNA-People\u2019s Legal Service law firm, and \u201cSherrie,\u201d a member of the Navajo Nation who shared her experience with fraud and asked that her last name not be used.<\/p>\n

Responding to a flyer in her postal box, Sherrie decided to trade in her Nissan Sentra for a new SUV, to better manage the Navajo Nation\u2019s bad roads.<\/p>\n

Particularly in Indian Country, consumers trust people\u2019s words. Sherrie believed the dealer\u2019s reassurances about the trade-in instead of reading the fine print in the contract.<\/p>\n

She learned the hard way that friendly salespeople aren\u2019t necessarily your friend.<\/p>\n

The SUV came with a monthly car payment. The dealer took her Nissan Sentra keys and reassured her he would \u201ctake care\u201d of the trade-in. She was soon deluged with stacks of bills as the car was repossessed and auctioned off after her original note went unpaid.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was really stressful,\u201d Sherrie said, \u201ca lot of headaches and all that. Me and my husband, we were talking about it all the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Desperate for help, Sherrie turned to the Attorney General\u2019s office and legal aid attorneys in Flagstaff\u00a0after hearing a \u201cLegal Minutes\u201d program regularly broadcast on the radio in English and Native languages.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe best way to reach people on the reservation is through the radio,\u201d Elliott said, \u201cbecause most people don\u2019t have good cell service.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Sherrie\u2019s case, pressure from the AG was enough to persuade the owner of the car dealership to settle the case without litigation and cover the more than $10,000 in fees she had been charged for the Nissan Sentra.<\/p>\n

Had her case been litigated through arbitration, she might have been at a disadvantage. Abritrators have to make decisions based on what the contract stipulates, and Sherrie\u2019s contract made no mention of a trade-in.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe found that the arbitrators do not sympathize with these types of cases,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cIt was far more effective using this fraud reporting mechanism, because the dealer is far more likely to listen and try to make good on their obligations if they\u2019re not in a litigation context.\u201d<\/p>\n

If a consumer feels unfairly treated, getting the FTC or other law enforcement agencies involved can produce better outcomes than an arbitrator would offer, Elliott said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s far better and more effective to engage with consumers before the harm is done,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cWe relied on the Arizona Consumer Fraud Act. It took a year and a half, a lot longer than it should have, but we got a good outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ByMark Hedin Nov 15, 2022 Determined...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-54505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-u-s-a"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=54505"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54505\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":54506,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/54505\/revisions\/54506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=54505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=54505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=54505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}