Consumer Action educates seniors on elder fraud, scams

In March, Consumer Action partnered with Woolf House, an affordable senior rental housing community in San Francisco, to conduct two elder fraud presentations (in both English and Chinese) for community residents and case managers.

Everyone must be on guard against scams, but seniors are often especially vulnerable. Many crooks—and even friends and family members—take advantage of the good nature of seniors to cheat them. According to a 2011 report by MetLife, victims of elder financial abuse suffer an estimated $2.9 billion in losses annually.

Consumer Action staff have partnered with Woolf House several times over the years to provide consumer education to community residents. This time, Consumer Action Associate Director of Outreach & Training Audrey Perrott conducted the English presentation, while Community Outreach Manager Jamie Woo did so in Chinese. Over 40 residents and two case managers attended the presentations.

“We appreciate the ongoing opportunities to partner with Woolf House to deliver these critical educational services to their residents,” Perrott said.

The presentations covered content from Consumer Action’s elder fraud educational training module. Perrott and Woo discussed types of fraud, how to detect fraud, victim resources and more. As a bonus, the trainers engaged in a game of “fraud bingo” with residents to test their knowledge in a fun and safe environment (and award prizes!). The game posed scenarios such as: “A person calls you to say that you’ve won a huge sweepstakes that you never entered. This is a…?” and allowed players to mark their bingo sheets with answers. (This call is a scam!)

Attendees left the presentation with an arsenal of information to protect against elder fraud and report any abuse to the appropriate authorities.

Woolf House’s Social Service Manager Ellen Trinh thanked Perrott and Woo “for the wonderful presentations, which our seniors loved!” She added that “the information was very helpful.”

Consumer Action partners with its nearly 7,000 network partners to educate consumers across the country and empower them to prosper financially. Core products and services include multilingual consumer education publications for underrepresented consumers; train-the-trainer events in-person and online; ongoing support of network partners; and much more.