Drought-impacted SA farmers snared by $300 fake hay scam

Worn down by drought, this farmer thought he was getting an alright deal for desperately-needed feed for his animals. Now, he wants his pain to be a lesson for others.

An Adelaide Hills farmer looking to buy feed for his horses has been caught out by a hay scam, and now he’s warning others to keep an eye out or risk losing money, and fodder.

James Gilbert, 34, has a 30-acre horse farm in Brukunga, and has been forced, like many drought-impacted farmers across the state, to ration his hay and hope for rain.

Adelaide Hills farmer James Gilbert has warned others about hay scams targeting "emotionally primed" farmers. Picture: Supplied

Mr Gilbert said he had a hay order on the way, but when an offer for cheap hay bales came up on Facebook that “actually didn’t seem too good to be true” he couldn’t turn it down — until he was out of pocket $300 with no hay.

“I know it sounds bad now, but it didn’t seem like a scam,” Mr Gilbert said.

“I hear about probably eight to 10 different scams per month and this one had everything right — they were only asking for a small deposit, had a good story, they spoke well, the bank account matched the name, the bank account was in (South Australia).

An SA farmer has warned others to keep an eye out for hay scams after being hit by one himself. Picture: Zoe Phillips

“The biggest loss is not the money, but the hay. You’re just kind of f***ed basically, you’ve got to call the bank and try get them to stop the transfer, but that’s it.”

Mr Gilbert said SA farmers were “emotionally primed” which made them easy targets for scams.

“(Scammers) post something too good to be true, really emotive language and really time pressuring,” he said.

“The only advice I’d give someone is talk to the person on the phone, ask them questions like how’s the weather because you can work out pretty quickly if they’re not a farmer.”

Farmers in the state’s Mid North received 1500 hay bales last week but Mr Gilbert said things were still very dire for the state and opportunistic scammers were just “kicking people when they’re down for easy money”.

A spokeswoman from the National Anti-Scam Centre said it was “aware of hay scams circulating on social media”.

“The National Anti-Scam Centre encourages people to report any suspicious scam activity to Scamwatch as it provides crucial intelligence to help disrupt scam networks,” the spokeswoman said.

Consumer and Business Affairs Minister Andrea Michaels said it was “reprehensible” that anyone would target people impacted by drought.

“It’s really awful to hear that our farmers are being targeted by scammers in this way,” she said.

“I urge people to always be cautious when buying anything off social media. If an offer sounds too good to be true, it usually is.”

Originally published as Drought-impacted SA farmers snared by $300 fake hay scam