Sadly, there are people out there who will try and part you from your money through any means possible and because you are trusting and in a new country, you may panic when someone in authority tells you to send money to them.
I am talking about that age-old profession of ‘scamming’.
The latest one doing the rounds at the moment is targeting Tier 4 international students. We have had a report that scammers are calling people claiming to be from the UKVI/ UKBA or a similar government body and telling them that they have made mistakes on their landing cards and if they don’t make a payment over the phone within the next couple of hours, they would be facing deportation the next day.
THIS IS NOT TRUE.
We have already spoken to the Home Office and they have confirmed this this kind of activity is indeed a scam.
International students sometimes can find themselves easy targets, especially when coming to study in the UK because they want to stay within the law in order to continue their studies.
Something that may jeopardise this can cause them alarm and without thinking, they may agree to pay in order to stay.
No official UK Government organisation will ask you to pay for anything over the phone, so please don’t be fooled by them, no matter how plausible it may sound.
If you have been approached by anyone giving you a similar story, please report it to the International Office Welfare team at welfare.io@coventry.ac.uk or the Tier 4 Compliance Team at tier4compliance.re@coventry.ac.uk
