BOSTON (WHDH) – The message looked legitimate and urgent, but following its instructions set off a chain of costly clicks for Karen Caplan.
The text claimed there was a problem with a credit card charge and instructed her to call a number for help.
“When we called the number to rectify it, he walked us through all this rigmarole of what we had to do. I was distracted, and before we knew what we were doing, we had transferred all this money out from our accounts,” said Caplan.
In minutes, nearly $5,000 disappeared from Caplan’s Venmo account.
“When we kind of realized what had happened and we contacted our bank, we noticed that, in fact, the money had been withdrawn from our accounts,” she said.
Caplan’s bank put the money back into her account, but her Venmo account was still frozen.
“It was, you know, unfortunate, because it’s such a reputable way to transfer funds. Everybody uses it,” said Karen.
Caplan says she sent a letter from her bank to Venmo.
“When I contacted Venmo, they said they reviewed the letter and what had happened and they could not resolve it, and the case was closed, and there was no further action that could be taken,” said Caplan.
But Caplan could take further action…she called Solve It 7.
“We watch all the time on TV. So many people have had their issues resolved quickly. I thought, okay, well, this is a good next step,” said Caplan.
Our next step was to contact PayPal, Venmo’s parent company.
Not long after, the freeze was finally lifted.
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