A recovery scam involves fraudsters going after people who have already paid a scammer. Once they know you’ve been scammed, they’ll send you text, email or letter claiming to be able to help you recover the money you lost. Often, they tell you that you must pay them or give them your personal financial information before they recover your lost funds. But once you do, they’ll disappear.

Getting scammed once is enough – but twice in a row? That’s something to avoid at all costs! Here are a few ways to protect yourself from recovery scams:

• Never agree to pay up front for help getting a refund. If someone asks you for a fee or personal information up front to get a refund from a recent scam, they are a fraud. Simple as that!
  
  
• Don’t deposit any refund checks you may receive – especially for more money than you lost. A common recovery scam method involves the scammer sending you a check worth more than you lost. They’ll claim they made a mistake and ask you to cash the check, keep the amount you’re owed, and send the rest back to them. That check will inevitably bounce – maybe weeks later – and the financial institution will ask that you pay ALL that money back.
  
  
• Always research any organization that contacts you asking for money. Fraudsters are known for pretending to be government agencies or other organizations to gain your trust and trick you into giving them your information. If one of them contacts you, type the name of the organization into a search engine with the words “scam” or “fraud” to see if this is a common scam attempt.
  
  You can also contact the organization with a number or email listed online to check and make sure the request is legitimate – DO NOT use the number given to you by the person who contacted you.
  
  
• DELETE all unsolicited correspondence from someone claiming that they can recover the money you lost in scam, for a fee. You should never give money or personal information to someone you don’t know online or over the phone – and that is even more important to remember after you have already fallen victim to a scam.
  
  
• Be wary of anyone who asks for strange methods of payment. Scammers will almost always ask that you pay them with cash, cryptocurrency, gift cards or wire transfers.
  

If you believe you’re being contacted by a scammer, you can report it at www.reportfraud.ftc.gov. And remember… NEVER give out your personal information to someone you don’t know over the phone or internet.