What to Do if You’re Contacted by a Publishers Clearing House Scammer!
Greetings, fans and friends,
“How do I report a PCH scam?”
“I think I’m being scammed. What should I do?
“Someone who said they were from PCH tried to scam me. Help!”
If you think you’ve been contacted by a Publishers Clearing House scammer, you may think there’s nothing that you can do. But that is absolutely not true. Here at PCH, we work hard to protect consumers from fraudulent scam artists!
We think it’s flat-out wrong when unscrupulous individuals impersonate the “real” PCH and contact fans and friends like you – often asking their victims to send some sort of payment or fee to claim a fake PCH “prize” (which, by the way, is something the real PCH would never, ever do). At Publishers Clearing House the winning is always free!
That’s why we have a super-easy way to report scams – our online PCH Scam Incident Report.
No matter whether a scammer has contacted you by phone, by postal mail, by email or by social media (such as Facebook), we strongly encourage you to fill out the online PCH scam form.
Our online scam incident report will take you step-by-step through a short list of questions regarding the scam contact you received – with the goal of helping us to better protect unsuspecting consumers!
Here’s how to report a PCH scam …
- First, visit the scam report page, which is on the pch.com website, by clicking here. In fact, why not bookmark this page in case you’re contacted by a PCH scammer?
- Click on the link to the scam incident report (it’s in the first paragraph of the “Answer”) and you will arrive at the Fraud/Scam Incident Report Page:
- Please read through this page and if you’ve received a scam contact from someone claiming to be from Publishers Clearing House, click on the “Yes” circle.
- You will then be asked if you sent or lost money to the scammers. If you answer “Yes,” you will be prompted to submit pertinent information about the scam incident, such as your name and phone number, the date and time of the incident, your home address, your email address, the amount of money you sent to the scammer, and any additional comments you’d like to report (see the picture below for a portion of this page).
- Once you’ve filled out your information and hit “Submit,” PCH will share your information with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), the US Postal Service, and law enforcement officials around the country, in our efforts to help these agencies put a stop to such illegal and fraudulent activities.
- As an extra precaution, if you lost money to a scammer, we recommend that you report the scam to your local authorities, in addition to filling out the PCH scam incident report.
- For more information on scam prevention, check out PCH’s Consumer Affairs link on pch.com.
By the way, it is very important that you NOT engage further with a PCH scammer. Do not send any more money, and do not reply to their calls, emails, letters or Facebook/Instagram/Twitter messages!
Please stay safe, fans and friends! At PCH it’s all about winning and having fun … for FREE!
Debbie K.
PCH Creative
P.S. I know that many of you will comment below describing your experiences with PCH scammers. That’s great, because the information you share will help your fellow blog readers. But PLEASE don’t forget to also fill out the PCH Scam Report I’ve just talked about! Thank you!
Other blogs you may find helpful:
Important Message: Protect Yourself from Scammers!
Sweepstakes Scam Alert: Are YOU Accidentally Helping Scammers?
