So I was out doing food deliveries yesterday via UberEats/Postmates and had an interesting afternoon where some people attempted to defraud me out of my earnings/possibly my account. I'll break it out in bullet points since I think the story will be easier to follow that way:
1) I received a delivery request through the app like normal, the order is from McDonald's and the contents of the order are a single cookie.
2) I pick up the order and drive it to the indicated address for drop-off. I approach the building (an apartment complex) and someone that was hanging out in the lobby greets me at the door.
3) They inform me that nobody lives in that building, they're just finishing renovations and no one will be moving in for a few more weeks.
4) I call the number indicated in the account, the person on the other end of the line says they'll be right out.
5) I receive a call from a San Francisco number (all calls from Uber come from San Francisco numbers). The person on the line tells me they're from Uber support.
6) They tell me that people have been sharing accounts to commit fraud and that they think my account has been compromised.
7) They then ask me to verify who I am by telling them how much money is in my balance at the moment (fishing to see if it's worth their time). This is the only question they ask, I don't give them a specific number.
8) They then say that they've confirmed that my account has been breached and they'll need to send me a new "Uber Go card" (which does not exist) but in the meantime I need to enter the card's info into my payment info to activate it.
9) Of course by this point I'm well aware of their scammy ways, having interacted with Uber support many times over the last 5 years, I ask them how many people they really get with this scam. They reiterate that they are just trying to protect my account and that if I don't comply they'll have to deactivate my account. I let them know that I can hear their kid in the background, they're not very good at this scam, thank them for the free cookie and the delivery fee and hang up.
10) They spam password reset requests using my phone number, locking my account (although notably this does not lock me out of the Uber app, just web services, so I could still receive trips).
11) I call Uber support and report the incident and the account used for the scam, they lock my account and run whatever fraud checks that have available to them. My account does not seem to be compromised so they unlock it and I immediately reset my security settings/password. No harm done to my account/earnings.
I do wonder how many people fall for this scam? In retrospect the single cookie order might have been an immediate tip-off, but people place ridiculous orders all the time. They also often leave alternate phone numbers in the delivery notes just in case they're unreachable through the app, maybe their landline or a spouse/roommate's number, like 60% of the time there's alternate phone numbers in the order notes. I could have called Uber support immediately after learning no one was in the building but when you're in the middle of the busy period you do kinda get in the mindset of "just find the customer and complete the order so you can move on to the next one." I've also never run into a scam like this and I've been registered with Uber for like 5 years, so my scam radar wasn't really calibrated for this sort of thing.
I just don't get how people would prefer fraud over getting an ordinary job. I can't imagine it pays well enough to cover the risk of getting caught.
A lot of these frauds are near impossible to actually catch and prosecute. They are so small scale and fly by night that it's rare that there are any repercussions. It's only when they actually get big that the Eye of Sauron gets shone upon them.
Also if they are in a country that is currently going through civil unrest or otherwise has an upset economy with hyper inflation that even a few US dollars here and there would be a big net gain.
I just don't get how people would prefer fraud over getting an ordinary job. I can't imagine it pays well enough to cover the risk of getting caught.
Human beings get some kind of thrill out of feeling they are getting one over on someone or otherwise beating the system.
When I worked at Starbucks people would come in all the time with a bunch of starbucks cards that were juuuust the right price for a cash refund under California’s law. So, someone showing up with 10 or 20 $10 Starbucks cards.
They were always some customer we had never seen before. They were always a mix of aggressive and nervous. It was always obviously a scam, with cards probably bought with stolen credit cards or similar. It basically never worked.
Even if it did, they’d likely be making less an hour and just like, working at Starbucks and getting an hourly wage. All the time spent getting the cards, driving from store to store, getting turned down, etc.
But a real job doesn’t have that thrill of “sticking it to the man” or “beating the system” or whatever.
I just don't get how people would prefer fraud over getting an ordinary job. I can't imagine it pays well enough to cover the risk of getting caught.
Human beings get some kind of thrill out of feeling they are getting one over on someone or otherwise beating the system.
When I worked at Starbucks people would come in all the time with a bunch of starbucks cards that were juuuust the right price for a cash refund under California’s law. So, someone showing up with 10 or 20 $10 Starbucks cards.
They were always some customer we had never seen before. They were always a mix of aggressive and nervous. It was always obviously a scam, with cards probably bought with stolen credit cards or similar. It basically never worked.
Even if it did, they’d likely be making less an hour and just like, working at Starbucks and getting an hourly wage. All the time spent getting the cards, driving from store to store, getting turned down, etc.
But a real job doesn’t have that thrill of “sticking it to the man” or “beating the system” or whatever.
9) Of course by this point I'm well aware of their scammy ways, having interacted with Uber support many times over the last 5 years, I ask them how many people they really get with this scam. They reiterate that they are just trying to protect my account and that if I don't comply they'll have to deactivate my account. I let them know that I can hear their kid in the background, they're not very good at this scam, thank them for the free cookie and the delivery fee and hang up.
I dunno man sounds like scamming has better child support options than Starbucks.
Personally I stick it to the man by getting a 9-5er and just being really bad at it. Take that, system.
There's also: they are working a 9-5, just for some guy who is holding their passport hostage and they are now neck deep in a human trafficking/organized crime shitshow.
You never know. When you get a scam call you're not morally obliged to think about what kind of sad story is on the other end of the line, but there's more than one flavor of scam artist out there.
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FishmanPut your goddamned hand in the goddamned Box of Pain.Registered Userregular
On weekend emails:
My wife travelled into work this morning in the heavy rain to attend a 8am Monday morning meeting.
The meeting was cancelled at 7:40pm Sunday night via email. Note the meeting was not cancelled and updated in their calenders; a manual email was sent saying not to turn up. It was still in their diaries when they got up and checked this morning.
I'm not sure I can summon enough side eye for this on a Monday.
Oh my God I just need people to listen to me and nod and do what I say the first time and not ask stupid questions and try and wheedle to see if they can get out of doing it because I absolutely know what you're doing and it's only going to make me angrier.
I definitely do not need to be in any kind of direct management. I am not a people person. I am not good at gently encouraging people to do things they should already be doing nor am I good at kindly explaining stuff for the third or fourth time. I am filled with the spirit of a large bird that flew into someone's enclosed porch I just want to smash into things and rage shit.
Recruiter hit me up today with a pitch that included these three sentences back to back:
The typical work week is 50 hours. <firm name> values work life balance. There is little weekend work.
They go on to clarify that this is actually 50 hours/week but only three weeks per month for "reporting reasons"
They will not disclose the salary but say they pay "what they need to pay" for the right candidate.
I've half a mind to be like "ok, it will cost a half a million per year to get me to ignore all these giant waving red flags" just to see what they say.
At least it isn't like these chuckleheads.
People at the company work on average 10-12 hours/day, so about 50-60 hours/week. Some people work more than that. They have a flexible schedule; there is no requirement for when you are working, but this job would not be a fit for someone seeking work life balance. It is a potential fit for someone who is seeking to work hard in a fast-paced, high stakes environment and earn a very lucrative income from their hard work.
Wow this is some Henry Ford approach to flex time. 'You can work whenever you feel like it, as long as it's every waking minute.'
Lemme tell ya, I never get tired of getting calls about the warranty on the car I don't have.
As someone with a job that ostensibly could receive calls from the general public, so I can't just ignore calls from unknown numbers, it's a fun game to play "is this an actual person or 'Amanda' again with a call from 'the dealer' about my expired warranty?"
I'd say about 20-80 human to spam these days, progress!(?)
Pellaeon on
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WeaverWho are you?What do you want?Registered Userregular
edited May 2021
I'm hoping to go back to work on Wednesday. I managed a treadmill run earlier today, but once I started reading and trying to type I keep having slip-ups. I'm starting to be worried that I'm going to have language problems going foreward or that my emotional effect is jacked.
Maybe the largest social media account that ostensibly advocates for my profession has been posting a lot of meme/fluff stuff about Elon Musk and his mom since they were on SNL and it's the last straw for me in terms of following them. Our field has a huge diversity problem so it's really fucking annoying that this account with tens of thousands of followers is boosting rich, white people.
+4
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CambiataCommander ShepardThe likes of which even GAWD has never seenRegistered Userregular
Lemme tell ya, I never get tired of getting calls about the warranty on the car I don't have.
As someone with a job that ostensibly could receive calls from the general public, so I can't just ignore calls from unknown numbers, it's a fun game to play "is this an actual person or 'Amanda' again with a call from 'the dealer' about my expired warranty?"
I'd say about 20-80 human to spam these days, progress!(?)
Huh, now I'm wondering why I never got robocalls during my time at the call center. Maybe robo-menus automatically sort that shit out.
"If you divide the whole world into just enemies and friends, you'll end up destroying everything" --Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind
When I was still on the business side, I only really got fax machines through my lines as far as automated things.
I always said "I am sorry, I don't speak fax" before unceremoniously dropping the call.
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JedocIn the scupperswith the staggers and jagsRegistered Userregular
We've got a Cisco VOIP phone system at the library, and each library has an extension that patches directly into the public address system. One time a robo fax somehow got the PA extension into its rolodex and for about six months it would shriek fax noises all through the library without warning and at unpredictable intervals.
My desk was directly under one of the speakers, and it scared the shit out of me every single time it happened.
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sponoMining for Nose DiamondsBooger CoveRegistered Userregular
Maybe that fax machine was just trying to check out a book
Because of what I do and where I do it I've had the opportunity to work with lots and lots of adults who, for various reasons, can't maintain a normal job, and I've gotten a good look at how (this isn't news) the social safety nets in the US are lousy and also in many cases explicitly hostile to the people trying to keep and maintain benefits. I think it's really tempting and understandable to say that people are lazy, or like the feeling of pulling one over on a big company, or something else similar but the reasons people do that kind of thing are rarely that simple. The desperation that goes along with trying to string along minor scams like the gift card thing Inquisitor mentioned just so that you can get food/housing/your next fix is really harrowing, even experienced second-hand.
+6
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ani_game_bumOptimistic, Rule-Breaking Nice GuyThe Final World/DestinationRegistered Userregular
Because of what I do and where I do it I've had the opportunity to work with lots and lots of adults who, for various reasons, can't maintain a normal job, and I've gotten a good look at how (this isn't news) the social safety nets in the US are lousy and also in many cases explicitly hostile to the people trying to keep and maintain benefits. I think it's really tempting and understandable to say that people are lazy, or like the feeling of pulling one over on a big company, or something else similar but the reasons people do that kind of thing are rarely that simple. The desperation that goes along with trying to string along minor scams like the gift card thing Inquisitor mentioned just so that you can get food/housing/your next fix is really harrowing, even experienced second-hand.
Knowing someone who got scammed (who happened to be in America, but I think it is very universal) they are very intelligent. But they were caught on the wrong day, where they happened to be feeling vulnerable and the scammers took advantage of that (and if you are nice they take advantage of that too) and isolate and make you feel scared, so if you are in that vulnerable enough condition and the scammers happen to catch you, yeah, unfortunately they’ll take your money.
I typed that out in a hurry, what I should have made clear is that I'm talking about the little hustles like the gift card example; coordinated large scale scamming like that Uber scam is a different league and those people can fuck off into the sea. It's one thing to steal some stuff and try to return it, that's a crime and it's bad but it's possible I have sympathy for that individual person, it's something else to bombard people with clever ways to steal their personal information and/or money.
Edit: duh I should also have said I'm referring to the scammers, not the people getting scammed.
Corporations and jobs were a mistake and we should all go back to farming and eating beans we grew ourselves and drinking liquor we also grew ourselves.
I will help you grow your beans and make your bean 'shine, Juggernut.
Corporations and jobs were a mistake and we should all go back to farming and eating beans we grew ourselves and drinking liquor we also grew ourselves.
I will help you grow your beans and make your bean 'shine, Juggernut.
holy crap, mods
Taint no mods er revenuer man gon' take mah bean-shine
This was my night at work on several points
I was asked to do water then follow up with a manager {asked to do chemicals} Water took me forever due to not finding pallets {they left them in the locked trailer :rotate: Then I did 4 of the 7 pallets of chemicals before he sent over help so I would go help Frozen as they were dragging ass
At lunch they put on Jarhead and asked me is what what's it's like I just said it's a 2 hour ad why you should attend college [it just brought up mentally things I wish not to remember nor do I know how to talk about it}
Another point was I was told the day time backroom manager will be coming to overnights to watch how frozen dairy work. I just frowned saying goody doomed to frozen
But when I got to frozen and started to help them they gave up. As after 7am they were hanging out near the baler throwing cardboard and talking
I just went home
Oh my God I'm getting so manay crypto and bitcoin ads lately. Every single YouTube ad is for that fucking WeBull(shit) site or some kinda doge coin credit card.
It seems I am a glutton for punishment as I had to do 1700 pieces or all of grocery by myself!
My arms and calves are tired but that was seriously some BS
THe problem of why i don't risk unemployment is the state said No when I got fired for calling my not manager a bully {still will make fun of the fact he had the form already filled out all he had to do was plug in why and the date}
Over the pandemic the state ran out of money in the unemployment fund and the loan they got from the Federal gov {that is another tale that I know will be a lesson in pain for this state}
So if I get fired or such now I know they will say NO again
Okay, but have you applied for any other jobs recently
If you won't risk unemployment that's the only other route unless you want to stay there forever
@Brainleech I can all but guarantee you an interview for a well paying tech support job with benefits an hour outside of Abq. If you'll apply let me know and I'll PM you when we post it, all you'll need is transport.
+22
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Zonugal(He/Him) The Holiday ArmadilloI'm Santa's representative for all the southern states. And Mexico!Registered Userregular
Today at work we started our two-week long class competition, with our first event being a live-streamed Super Smash Bros Ultimate tournament between our sophomore, junior, & senior classes.
During it some of the teachers in attendance mentioned that they wish the game chosen had been a Mario Party instead.
Eventually I was asked for my thoughts on Mario Party.
Posts
1) I received a delivery request through the app like normal, the order is from McDonald's and the contents of the order are a single cookie.
2) I pick up the order and drive it to the indicated address for drop-off. I approach the building (an apartment complex) and someone that was hanging out in the lobby greets me at the door.
3) They inform me that nobody lives in that building, they're just finishing renovations and no one will be moving in for a few more weeks.
4) I call the number indicated in the account, the person on the other end of the line says they'll be right out.
5) I receive a call from a San Francisco number (all calls from Uber come from San Francisco numbers). The person on the line tells me they're from Uber support.
6) They tell me that people have been sharing accounts to commit fraud and that they think my account has been compromised.
7) They then ask me to verify who I am by telling them how much money is in my balance at the moment (fishing to see if it's worth their time). This is the only question they ask, I don't give them a specific number.
8) They then say that they've confirmed that my account has been breached and they'll need to send me a new "Uber Go card" (which does not exist) but in the meantime I need to enter the card's info into my payment info to activate it.
9) Of course by this point I'm well aware of their scammy ways, having interacted with Uber support many times over the last 5 years, I ask them how many people they really get with this scam. They reiterate that they are just trying to protect my account and that if I don't comply they'll have to deactivate my account. I let them know that I can hear their kid in the background, they're not very good at this scam, thank them for the free cookie and the delivery fee and hang up.
10) They spam password reset requests using my phone number, locking my account (although notably this does not lock me out of the Uber app, just web services, so I could still receive trips).
11) I call Uber support and report the incident and the account used for the scam, they lock my account and run whatever fraud checks that have available to them. My account does not seem to be compromised so they unlock it and I immediately reset my security settings/password. No harm done to my account/earnings.
I do wonder how many people fall for this scam? In retrospect the single cookie order might have been an immediate tip-off, but people place ridiculous orders all the time. They also often leave alternate phone numbers in the delivery notes just in case they're unreachable through the app, maybe their landline or a spouse/roommate's number, like 60% of the time there's alternate phone numbers in the order notes. I could have called Uber support immediately after learning no one was in the building but when you're in the middle of the busy period you do kinda get in the mindset of "just find the customer and complete the order so you can move on to the next one." I've also never run into a scam like this and I've been registered with Uber for like 5 years, so my scam radar wasn't really calibrated for this sort of thing.
A lot of these frauds are near impossible to actually catch and prosecute. They are so small scale and fly by night that it's rare that there are any repercussions. It's only when they actually get big that the Eye of Sauron gets shone upon them.
Also if they are in a country that is currently going through civil unrest or otherwise has an upset economy with hyper inflation that even a few US dollars here and there would be a big net gain.
Origin ID: Discgolfer27
Untappd ID: Discgolfer1981
Human beings get some kind of thrill out of feeling they are getting one over on someone or otherwise beating the system.
When I worked at Starbucks people would come in all the time with a bunch of starbucks cards that were juuuust the right price for a cash refund under California’s law. So, someone showing up with 10 or 20 $10 Starbucks cards.
They were always some customer we had never seen before. They were always a mix of aggressive and nervous. It was always obviously a scam, with cards probably bought with stolen credit cards or similar. It basically never worked.
Even if it did, they’d likely be making less an hour and just like, working at Starbucks and getting an hourly wage. All the time spent getting the cards, driving from store to store, getting turned down, etc.
But a real job doesn’t have that thrill of “sticking it to the man” or “beating the system” or whatever.
Personally I stick it to the man by getting a 9-5er and just being really bad at it. Take that, system.
You never know. When you get a scam call you're not morally obliged to think about what kind of sad story is on the other end of the line, but there's more than one flavor of scam artist out there.
My wife travelled into work this morning in the heavy rain to attend a 8am Monday morning meeting.
The meeting was cancelled at 7:40pm Sunday night via email. Note the meeting was not cancelled and updated in their calenders; a manual email was sent saying not to turn up. It was still in their diaries when they got up and checked this morning.
I'm not sure I can summon enough side eye for this on a Monday.
Hahahahaha
haha
hahahahaha!
Wow this is some Henry Ford approach to flex time. 'You can work whenever you feel like it, as long as it's every waking minute.'
As someone with a job that ostensibly could receive calls from the general public, so I can't just ignore calls from unknown numbers, it's a fun game to play "is this an actual person or 'Amanda' again with a call from 'the dealer' about my expired warranty?"
I'd say about 20-80 human to spam these days, progress!(?)
Huh, now I'm wondering why I never got robocalls during my time at the call center. Maybe robo-menus automatically sort that shit out.
I always said "I am sorry, I don't speak fax" before unceremoniously dropping the call.
My desk was directly under one of the speakers, and it scared the shit out of me every single time it happened.
Y’ever think of that?
Because of what I do and where I do it I've had the opportunity to work with lots and lots of adults who, for various reasons, can't maintain a normal job, and I've gotten a good look at how (this isn't news) the social safety nets in the US are lousy and also in many cases explicitly hostile to the people trying to keep and maintain benefits. I think it's really tempting and understandable to say that people are lazy, or like the feeling of pulling one over on a big company, or something else similar but the reasons people do that kind of thing are rarely that simple. The desperation that goes along with trying to string along minor scams like the gift card thing Inquisitor mentioned just so that you can get food/housing/your next fix is really harrowing, even experienced second-hand.
Thanks for the heads up; haven't encountered anything that elaborate myself but I am in a much smaller market.
Only real "scam" I deal with is college kids not adding a tip to their order.
Knowing someone who got scammed (who happened to be in America, but I think it is very universal) they are very intelligent. But they were caught on the wrong day, where they happened to be feeling vulnerable and the scammers took advantage of that (and if you are nice they take advantage of that too) and isolate and make you feel scared, so if you are in that vulnerable enough condition and the scammers happen to catch you, yeah, unfortunately they’ll take your money.
Satans..... hints.....
Edit: duh I should also have said I'm referring to the scammers, not the people getting scammed.
holy crap, mods
Taint no mods er revenuer man gon' take mah bean-shine
I was asked to do water then follow up with a manager {asked to do chemicals} Water took me forever due to not finding pallets {they left them in the locked trailer :rotate: Then I did 4 of the 7 pallets of chemicals before he sent over help so I would go help Frozen as they were dragging ass
At lunch they put on Jarhead and asked me is what what's it's like I just said it's a 2 hour ad why you should attend college [it just brought up mentally things I wish not to remember nor do I know how to talk about it}
Another point was I was told the day time backroom manager will be coming to overnights to watch how frozen dairy work. I just frowned saying goody doomed to frozen
But when I got to frozen and started to help them they gave up. As after 7am they were hanging out near the baler throwing cardboard and talking
I just went home
Refuse to do frozen
No, and also fuck you.
I hate it.
"At my own pace" can include "never"
Alternatively on such a long time scale that it effectively becomes never
@Brainleech I can all but guarantee you an interview for a well paying tech support job with benefits an hour outside of Abq. If you'll apply let me know and I'll PM you when we post it, all you'll need is transport.
During it some of the teachers in attendance mentioned that they wish the game chosen had been a Mario Party instead.
Eventually I was asked for my thoughts on Mario Party.
And well...