A Berkeley woman almost fell for a scam when a person called her claiming to be a Pacific Gas and Electric employee and said she had an hour to pay up or the power would be shut off.
KRON4’s Ella Sogomonian spoke with the woman who was trying to do a good deed.
Jeanne Pimentel was nearly scammed out of $500 when she tried to help a friend suffering from memory loss who got a call last week from a person claiming to be a PG&E worker.
The caller claimed that Pimentel’s friend hadn’t paid her bill in three months.
“I wasn’t aware that my friend had gotten any warning notices but then she would have forgotten anyway so it seemed reasonable to me that she might not have paid the bills,” Pimentel said.
The caller told the woman to purchase a Green Dot Moneypak for $5.95, load the card with money and read back the access codes.
The caller remained on the phone for a whole hour talking them through it.
Luckily, in the end, Pimentel didn’t buy into it but is upset by the organized scheme.
“These people are smart and how can they use their smartness to do something that is not only illegal and therefore risky but really really evil and to target such people that cannot defend themselves I find that very hard to understand,” she said.
Scam callers are able to disguise their phone numbers posing a challenge. Pimentel is warning other seniors so they don’t fall prey.