COVID Scams Trick Americans Out Of $544M, FTC Reports

The fear of the COVID pandemic was ripe for tricking Americans out of money as the Federal Trade Commission has reported that more than $545 million has been scammed from consumers since the coronavirus crisis started.

Scams ranged from online shopping and vacation and travel to diet products and credit card schemes, which cost Americans significantly during the pandemic, according to the FTC report.

The agency said it received nearly 589,000 consumer complaints about COVID-related scams from Jan. 1, 2020, through Aug. 30, 2021, with 61% of those complaints centering around fraud. The median loss to American consumers was $380.

Online shopping scored as the top complaint to the FTC, with nearly 55,000 complaints made during the pandemic, which may have been due to price gouging at the height of the COVID crisis.

Susan Grant, director of consumer protection and privacy at the advocacy group Consumer Federation of America, said in July, “Scammers always take advantage of disasters, man-made or natural,” CNBC reported.

According to a report by the Consumer Federation of America, price gouging was the most common consumer complaint during the pandemic in 2020, with hundreds of complaints to state and local consumer agencies, according to the ones polled for its study.

Numerous price-gouging complaints were reported for hard-to-find essential items such as hand sanitizer, toilet paper, gloves, and face masks found in stores and online. Amazon third-party retailers were accused of the exorbitant price increases, causing the e-commerce giant to remove the products from its site.

It also comes as no surprise that online shopping scams accounted for the largest majority of FTC complaints during the pandemic as most consumers turned toward online shopping for purchases during lockdown orders and beyond to prevent the spread of the virus.

But it was “consumer beware” for many shoppers who did not receive the products they ordered as they became victims of “opportunistic websites” that claimed to have high-demand items that consumers wanted and needed now, CNBC reported.

Vacations and travel complaints were also on the rise, reaching 44,500 complaints, followed by credit bureau complaints at just over 18,500 complaints, and diet product schemes had 15,092 consumer complaints. Lastly, credit card scams had just over 14,500 complaints from Americans, according to the FTC.