“Toll evasion” scam

True, I did forget to attach my toll pass the other day before getting on I-4 Express, but I think we have it all fixed.

But today I got this text. Looks legit.

Definitely give them your SSN and credit card numbers. 

I've gotten 2 of those today; maybe 5 in the last 10 days. The Philippine country code definitely gives me a warm feeling.

Of course, my local Nextdoor group is taking time off from ranting about their latest electricity bill* to ask each other if this is legitimate.

* Elections have consequences and so does feel-good legislation.  Surprise!  That's all I'm going to say about that.

Yeah, I was getting a number of those a few weeks back.  The nearest toll road is probably 30 miles from me, and I have never driven on any toll roads, and rarely drive more than 10 miles from my house....

...so yeah...

one of the odd benefits of not having a FL area code, I get whole different scams. 

Dad got one earlier Today. He's 85, legally blind, and hasn't driven for 15 years. 
He said "I think this is a scam"

Think?

OHSCrifle said:

Definitely give them your SSN and credit card numbers. 

Already done. Plus the name of my high school gym teacher. 

You need the friendly toll collectors I have.



I have had a very pleasant journey paying them my vehicle's unpaid toll balance invoice for last month.

I thought this was about using Necco wafers in the Illinois Tollway baskets back in the day. 
 

In reply to Datsun240ZGuy :

Except they didn't work.

Steve Dahl started the rumor along with others to cheat the toll road.   The Illinois Tollway later reported 12 toll machines broken due to Necco Wafers.

I received a series of these about 2 months ago.  Our closest tolls are bridges 7 or 8 hours away in the SF Bay area - the Golden Gate in particular.  

Haven't been over it in a couple of years.

I've been getting a bunch of these in the past month also.

Got one today. As soon as I saw "Ur" instead of "Your", I knew this wasn't official

I too was getting sunpass unpaid toll scams. I haven't been anywhere near one.  
Over 20 years ago my brother told me about all the dropped change by the toll baskets. It was easy in a Honda to crack the door and reach down for the needed funds.

I almost checked my Illinois Tollway account, scratched that off my list.

It's the new Nigerian.

If these folks ever learned English their take would at least double. I live within a mile of a toll bridge run by a bi-state kleptocracy. Their cameras are good enough to read a GRM sticker and their English, Spanish and Tagalog are error free.

I've gotten two of those in the last couple months, but weirdly both come within a day of me getting legit toll bills in the mail, so a tiny pat of me wondered if SunPass just hired some really bad interns to write their billing copy. 

Mostly, though, i was left wondering whether it was just a pair of weirdly timed coincidences, or if the scammers were somehow mining location or billing data from some source or another to provide some cover for the scam. If so I almost respect the hustle.

See, I have a SunPass but haven't used it in years because tolls stress me out. So whenever I get a text or email about an unpaid toll, it goes straight to the trash. I don't even open the messages because, depending on the type of scam, even just opening it can give the person access to your device and info.

Has anybody here listened to the Expeditionary Force novels by Craig Alanson? Every time they're on Earth, one of the characters goes full-throttle creating insane scams and cults. Now, every time I get a message or a call from one of them, I just pretend I'm talking to or reading a message from Skippy, the Magnificent!, and it makes me feel a little better about it.

Jokes on them, I'm too poor to even have a Peach Pass, nor do I drive enough to use the Atlanta Lexus Lanes.

The legal ones are pretty much a scam too. 
 

There is one near me that is a known trap. It's a camera for a school zone. It's installed on a blind corner at the bottom of a hill. If you coast down the hill without touching the brakes or the gas, it will catch you. 
 

There were 35,000 school zone violations issued in my city last year. 30,000 of them were issued by the one camera. $75 per violation. That's $2,250,000 revenue generated from one camera. It's run by a private entity (NOT the city).

The part that bugs me is that it is issuing a moving violation without any knowledge of who is driving the car. It is sent to the registered owner.  I loaned my car to someone recently and I got the ticket. Same thing happened to my son. 
 

Im sure these cameras will soon be used for other things (like texting while driving, expired registration, or seatbelt violations)

Not cool. 

In reply to JG Pasterjak :

Same. I got a toll bill the other day, too.

I do use the Lexus Lanes whenever I’m in the Orlando. Fewer crazies. I figure it’s like insurance. 

NickD said:

Got one today. As soon as I saw "Ur" instead of "Your", I knew this wasn't official

I got this exact one. Who the hell tries this scam and can't spell out 'your'? How dumb have we become?

Don't answer that.

In reply to SV reX :

These are the things that bug me, too. It's not about safety, it's about profit; it's not even close. Look into companies such as RedFlex (who run a huge amount of red light cameras): They've been caught *repeatedly* screwing with yellow-light timing just to increase the number of tickets they issue, because they get something like 60-70% of the revenue generated by each ticket. The municipality gets a relative pittance (and, in fact, many municipalities have found that privately-run traffic cameras don't even add sigfnicantly to city revenue because the contracts give all the profits and none of the risk to the camera operator!). And, again, it's clearly not about safety. If it were about safety, they'd install traffic-calming measures rather than punitive ones. 

Then, of course, there's no right to face your accuser. 

As far as cameras being used to catch texters, etc.: That's already been implemented in Australia. I'm hugely opposed to texting while driving, but the cameras in Aus will even ticket you if you have a map running on your phone.