Watch above: A Saskatoon flower shop has been targeted by an online scam
SASKATOON – Carla Scharback, the proud owner of Blossoms Living flower shop in Saskatoon, has become embroiled in an online scam that wrongfully targets her customers.
“We had a client come in, and had Google searched our name, ‘Blossoms Saskatoon’, and realized that the phone number that came up attached to it wasn’t our local phone number,” she explained.
Scharback phoned the number and tracked it to a call centre in Thornhill, Ont.
“The people would answer the phone and say, ‘flower shop, how may I help you? And proceed to take a floral order,” she explained.
The caller then sent the order out to a wire service in the U.S., which came back to another florist in the province.
“The flowers would get filled and delivered, but not from my store, where the person would have originally thought they were calling,” Scharback explained.
After doing some research, she discovered she’s not alone – dozens of flower shops across North America have also been affected by this type of fraud.
“It has evidently become more far-reaching than this – so it may be more of something that’s a class-action endeavor, as I know it’s been happening to a lot of florists,” said Scharback.
Scharback contacted Saskatoon police and said they were helpful. On Friday, police issued a public advisory warning people a fraudulent website had been set up to look similar to the local flower shops.
The advisory said the alleged fraudsters may slap shoppers with extra fees on top of their initial charge and warned:
“Customers should take steps to ensure the business they are ordering flowers from is the one they intended to contact: ask the person answering what the shop’s street address is and directions on how to get there, report the activity to police and to the competitionbureau.gc.ca.”
Scharback will continue to work with police to combat the fraud.
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