Victim Location 77021
Type of a scam Utility
a guy called from 713-207-2222 pretending to be a CenterPoint Energy technician telling me they’re disconnecting our gas w/in 1 hour because we "didn’t pay the gas bill". Told me to call 800-692-0338 "billing department" to find out why. I freaked out because this is a business account and we can’t operate w/o gas! So, i called back per his instruction, this guy who claimed to be "Ryan in Billing department" said we didn’t pay the bill on time and the only way to stop the disconnect will be to pay the "balance" in a food store kiosk, IN CASH! He gave me the address to this food store in a very shady neighborhood, and ask me to bring the cash payment to a kiosk inside this store, then call him back to "give me a code" to process the payment. After I hang up w/ "Ryan", I decided to call CenterPointer Energy’s main line directly instead of the "Billing dep. #" they gave me, CenterPoint Energy told me this is a fraud & we owe zero balance. As I’m filing this fraud online, this "Ryan" guy called back from 800-342-5397 asking if I made it to the food store yet. I told him not to call me back because I’m calling the police on him, because there’s no way a utility provider will take cash payment only! The part that why "Ryan" insisted "no checks, no credit cards because those take 24 hr to process" and "not enough time to stop the technician from disconnecting w/in 1 Hr." gave way to my suspicion that this is a SCAM!!!