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Monday, July 07, 2003
DTI warns vs. buying empty cellphone cards
THE Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) 7 is warning the public against buying empty cellular phone cards from unscrupulous retailers.
DTI 7 Regional Director Aster Caberte said the DTI is now investigating a retailer based in Bohol who is engaged in this fraudulent activity.
“The DTI is now investigating a store in Bohol said to be selling used cellphone cards. We have heard that there are also some stores selling the same (empty phone cards) in Cebu and other parts of the region,” she said.
Caberte advised cellular phone card users to buy from established and known retailers.
Earlier, Junrex Cellphones and Accessories Inc. (Junrex) corporate services director Xavier Yap said buying airtime for cellular phones through the Eload service is one way of avoiding the purchase of empty cellular phone cards.
Information technology has allowed cellphone card retailers to sell airtime with just a voucher, instead of a plastic card, dispensed by an electronic terminal. Eloading is also more convenient as end-users will not have to look for sharp objects needed to scratch plastic cards.
Text scam
Meanwhile, DTI’s Caberte is also warning the public against the proliferation of scams through text messages, which usually inform cellphone owners that they have won a prize for a certain promotion.
She advised recipients of these kinds of messages to verify the validity of the promotion with the DTI. Reporting to the DTI would also help prevent the unscrupulous people from getting other victims, as the DTI could immediately investigate the matter.
“Despite our warning, these types of scams continue to victimize people. Usually, text messages would inform a recipient that he has won a raffle prize such as a car and he is required to deposit a certain amount of money to an account number for him to be able to claim his prize …Poverty is one of the reasons that people still fall for this kind of fraud,” she said.
One of the examples of a scam message is this: “The auditors of the Philippine Charity Foundation Office informs you that your mobile no. has won P950,000 2nd prize winner last April 20, 2003. For more information, call me now. I’m Ramon Santiago at this cell no. 09176912992.”
If you receive messages of this kind, report this to the DTI, Caberte said. JBN
(July 7, 2003 issue)
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