Yesterday I was pleased to launch Fraud Awareness Week - a joint initiative between the Ministry of Consumer Affairs and the Commerce Commission designed to help New Zealanders recognise, and protect themselves and others, from scams.

Around six percent of New Zealanders lose an average $2,500 each year (an estimated total of $487 million per annum) to scammers and fraudsters - who use all kinds of schemes to convince people to give over their money or personal details.
There is never a good time to lose money but in the current financial climate people are even worse placed to sustain losses.

There are many scams around - such as the Nigerian emails to banks supposedly writing to clients asking for credit card details. Recent media reports also tell of a group of men from the UK who offered to do asphalting jobs for cash. Up to $20,000 was paid for the work, some of which was so substandard that the victims had to pay legitimate companies to redo it.

Other scams have included a group of Irish itinerants selling defective generators from a van with fake invoices from a non-existent overseas company, and people asked to provide their credit card details to confirm their identity for a prize they had won in a competition.

Yesterday's launch of Fraud Awareness week was extremely positive. The event was hosted by Trade Me, with CEO Jon Macdonald speaking and introducing the speakers - myself, Netsafe Principal Knowledge Officer John Fenaughty and Liz Stretton from the Consumer Affairs Ministry. As we spoke we were surrounded by grocery items - $2,500 worth, in fact, kindly provided by Wellington's New World Chaffers to help provide a visual idea of what fraud costs Kiwi families in real terms.

The launch has generated quite a lot of publicity, and the hope is that it will help educate New Zealanders and enable them to spot scams and fraudsters before they part with their hard-earned money. From there, they can report these deceitful individual via the Consumer Ministry's 'scamwatch' website at www.scamwatch.govt.nz.

So a word of warning - if it seems to good to be true then, chances are, it probably is. My speech from the launch can be found at http://www.roy.org.nz/content/turn-tables-scammers-and-fraudsters.