Phone Scammer Using NH Fire Department ID

May 10, 2018
Fire officials are issuing a warning after a phone scammer has been claiming to be affiliated with the Keene Fire Department.

May 10 -- John Jones was pumping his bicycle tires in preparation for his first ride of the season when he received an unsettling phone call Tuesday.

“The caller ID said it was the Keene Fire Department,” Jones said. “I thought that was strange.”

Jones, 69, lives with his wife in Keene. A retired human services professional, Jones said he received the call around 11:15 a.m. on his Vonage home line.

When he answered, a woman on the other end identified herself as Jennifer and said she had been trying to reach him for a long time, Jones said.

“She said she wanted to give me a free medical alert,” Jones said. “I thought that was kind of strange coming from a fire department, so I hung up.”

Jones said he called back the number and found himself on the line with the actual Keene Fire Department. He said he asked whether they had placed the original call, but the person he spoke with told him no.

“They said they didn’t do that sort of thing,” Jones said. “I thought it must have been a scam or something like that.”

When contacted by The Sentinel Tuesday, Keene fire Capt. Arthur Johnson said the incident was news to him and pointed out that calls from the fire department are typically listed as “City of Keene” on caller identification systems.

“We don’t offer free medical devices,” Johnson added.

Jones said he frequently receives scam phone calls and ignores them, but in this case, the caller identification piqued his curiosity. He said he called Keene police after his bike ride to check whether they had received reports of similar calls but the person he spoke with said they had not. Jones declined to file a report.

Keene police Lt. Steven Tenney said he hadn’t heard about the incident, though he added that phone scams targeting older residents are relatively common.

“It’s usually involving the IRS or credit card-type stuff,” Tenney said. “This is the first I’ve heard about free medical equipment.”

Neither the police department nor the fire department typically makes cold calls, Tenney added. If either department is offering a free device or service, the details are typically well advertised and shared with city residents through official channels, he said.

“With any of these, my advice is that if it doesn’t sound right, it’s probably not right,” Tenney said. “I would suggest simply terminating the phone call.”

___ (c)2018 The Keene Sentinel (Keene, N.H.) Visit The Keene Sentinel (Keene, N.H.) at www.sentinelsource.com Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

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