Financial counsellors and community leaders across Western Australia’s remote north say a growing number of tax time scammers are targeting residents of remote communities.
It comes after the ABC identified Facebook accounts impersonating Centrelink and the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) interacting with people who appear to reside in the Kimberley region.
Elder Monica Stumpagee who lives in Beagle Bay, 130 kilometres north of Broome, was hit financially by the collapsed Youpla funeral fund in 2022.
She said that saga had made it harder to trust people.
“Who will we go to? We might get scammed again. We don’t know what to do, we’re just sitting on the edge,” she said.
Ms Stumpagee has noticed an increase in scams targeting residents within her community, even receiving Facebook requests from accounts posing as family members who have passed away.
“It’s really getting frequent … now we’re getting scammed on our phones, they’re pretending to be dead family members and some of my friends and family said they got ripped off,” she said.
“So yeah, we [are] just living in fear of being scammed.”
Ms Stumpagee is now taking part in financial counselling sessions in Beagle Bay to educate others within her community.
“I’m aware of all that now and I’m not going to fall for any tricks,” she said.
“What can we do? We vulnerable people get scammed all the time, so we try to help each other.”
Increased risk ahead of tax time
Broome Circle financial counsellor Veronica Johnson works with remote communities throughout the Dampier Peninsula building the capacity of community members to protect themselves from scams.
“[It’s] absolutely devastating for clients who are vulnerable, who are just now being taken for another ride in believing it’s Centrelink … when it clearly is not,” she said.
“And it’s just targeting the most vulnerable who in some cases are not aware that it’s not actually the government agency but a scammer.”
Last year, Australians lost $2.7 billion to scams, with older people suffering the greatest losses according to a report by the consumer watchdog.
From her experience, Ms Johnson said elderly residents in remote communities were often a greater target for scammers.
Athena Sarah, who works with Home Aged Community Care (HACC) based in Beagle Bay, said she was seeing a rise in online scams targeting residents in remote Aboriginal communities.
“It’s hard because you have some old people who don’t have transport to go into the bank or Centrelink and some people struggle to get in touch [with them] and find out where their money has been going,” she said.
“I think banks and Centrelink agents should be coming out, especially with the older people, and helping them.”
Report scams
Consumer Protection senior regional officer for the Kimberley Kevin Collard said residents should report any scams they came across to the WA government’s ScamNet website.
“People may feel a little bit embarrassed or a little bit shy or a degree of shame because they’ve been a victim of a scam,” Mr Collard said.
“It’s important to think that victim shouldn’t be embarrassed or ashamed. I mean, it’s the scammers who are the perpetrators here so they’re the ones who we don’t look favourably upon.
“I think it’s important that people do make that report so that more of the community can become aware of the types of scams that are out there.”
Get our local newsletter, delivered free each Tuesday