UK: The Builders' Merchants Federation has issued a warning to merchants about fraudsters targeting copper bundles.
All the incidents were of a similar nature: the merchant would receive a telephone call asking for an unusually high amount of copper. In some cases, the merchant was told that "price did not matter". A request was then made to purchase the copper over the telephone using a credit card.
When the customer was told that this is not possible they would hang up.
An alterative ruse is when the caller offers to send someone into the branch to pay in cash, but the person never turns up to fmake the payment.
Initial reports of these attempted 'cardholder not present' frauds began in the North, but have now spread as far afield as Essex.
The BMF also reported incidents from merchants relating to boiler sales that adopted the same methods.
