St. Charles caregivers and patients have received phone calls from fraudsters identifying themselves as employees of other local health care organizations or Medicare officials who are seeking valuable Medicare information for identity theft or fraudulent billing purposes.
The caller ID may appear as a legitimate number from a local medical facility. Falsifying a caller ID number in this way is known as “spoofing” and unfortunately St. Charles cannot prevent this type of criminal activity. According to the Office of Inspector General, these fraudsters are targeting beneficiaries through telemarketing calls, booths at public events, health fairs and door-to-door visits.
St. Charles is advising the public to be extremely cautious about ever giving medical or insurance information over the phone. If you think a caller is falsely representing St. Charles, Medicare or any other local medical facility, hang up and call your St. Charles provider’s office to find out if information is needed from you. If you think you have been a victim of any kind of phone scam, please consider reporting it to one of the following organizations:
- The Federal Trade Commission is the primary government agency that collects scam complaints.
Online: https://reportfraud.ftc.gov/#/
By phone: 1-877-382-4357
- To report suspected Medicare fraud: 1-800-MEDICARE (1-800-633-4227)
- Report caller ID spoofing to the Federal Communications Commission
Online: https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov/hc/en-us
By phone: 1-888-225-5322
- Report the scam to the Office of Inspector General
Online: https://oig.hhs.gov/fraud/report-fraud/
By phone: 1-800-447-8477
TTY: 1-800-377-4950
If you are the victim of identity theft, visit https://identitytheft.gov/ for information on how to report it.
To learn more about how to spot and avoid Medicare scams or scams in general, visit
https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2019/03/protect-yourself-against-medicare-scams
