Toowoomba tourism, travel business owner shares moment her client almost lost thousands in online scam

A Toowoomba business owner has shared the moment a client almost lost thousands of dollars in a sophisticated scam, which she believes has become a common way to target others. DETAILS HERE.

After two years of work to hold their business together during the devastating Covid-19 pandemic, a Toowoomba tourism operator has been targeted in a spineless scam.

The Toowoomba business owner, who works in the travel industry and has requested anonymity for privacy reasons, was alerted to the fraudulent attempt by a client.

An email containing an attached PDF file of an invoice was sent to the client requesting the payment of an outstanding balance of more than $8000.

The client, who had booked a trip through the provider but had previously made payments with a credit card, phoned the business owner to confirm its legitimacy, when it was determined it was a scam.

A Toowoomba business owner has issued a plea to the community to remain vigilant after she and a client were targeted in a sophisticated and damaging scam.

“I’ve worked really hard to hold my business together and I suffered two years of refunds, abuse and travel lockdowns when Covid shut down the world,” the business owner said.

“The tourism industry has struggled enough, so to then go through this and have someone trying to scam your clients and using your name – it could destroy my business and it’s just wrong.

“It’s a lot of money (to lose) and (my clients) have worked hard and saved that money so they can enjoy themselves in their later years.

“If they were to lose that money, it would be very distressing and detrimental.”

The travel operator said the scariest part about the fraudulent email and invoice was how sophisticated they looked, with the one of the only noticeable differences being the bank details which had been changed.

With almost a decade of experience in running her own business, she said she had never experienced such an elaborate and believable scam before.

“The fact that they were able to change the invoice details on the PDF shows these are people who have done this before,” she said.

“I managed to contact the bank the (scam) account was set up through and they locked it, but the scammers will keep setting up more – there’s no stopping them.”

The concerned business owner later determined no systems had been hacked or other clients had been targeted in the elaborate scam.

Hoping to raise awareness for other community members who may fall victim to similar tricks, she said she wanted to bring the incident to the attention of others and called for financial institutions and scamming bodies to take more action.

“Apparently this kind of scam is happening to a lot of businesses at the moment,” she said.

“At the end of the day, something needs to be done with the banking industry to intercept this before it’s too late.

“I’m astounded by the hurdles you have to go through to report these issues – it’s not an easy process – it’s a nightmare.

“The banks need to do more to bring this activity to the attention of the public because businesses and the community need to be protected.”

It comes just days after a Queensland couple lost $220,000 from their superannuation account after they fell victim to a scamming video online generated with AI technology.

For signs to look out for or to report a scam visit scamwatch.gov.au