Nolan County Sheriff's Office Reports Frequent IRS Scams

SWEETWATER, TX- The Nolan County Sheriff's Office has recently received reports from people who have been contacted by someone claiming to be from the IRS or the Treasury Department. These calls are believed to be a scam.

In some cases, the caller would tell the person answering the phone that they owe money to the IRS and must pay through a pre-loaded debit card, credit card or wire transfer, or face jail time. In other cases, the caller would tell the person answering that if they did not pay immediately, federal agents would be sent to their front door to collect.

As these telephone scams continue across the country, the IRS recently put out a new YouTube video with a renewed warning to taxpayers not to be fooled by imposters posing as tax agency representatives. The new Tax Scams video describes some basic tips to help protect taxpayers from tax scams.

The IRS will never:

• Call to demand immediate payment, nor will the agency call about taxes owed without first having mailed a bill.
• Demand that taxes be paid without giving recipients the opportunity to question or appeal the amount they say is owed.
• Require the use a specific payment method for taxes, such as a prepaid debit card.
• Ask for credit or debit card numbers over the phone.
• Threaten to bring in local police or other law-enforcement groups to have someone arrested for not paying.

If people get phone call from a person claiming to be from the IRS and they are asking for money, here’s what actions should be taken:

• If there is any question about owing money to IRS, call them at 1-800-829-1040. The IRS workers can help you with a payment issue.
• If there's no doubt about owing taxes, report the incident to the TIGTA at 1-800-366-4484 or at www.tigta.gov.
• If someone has been targeted by this scam, also contact the Federal Trade Commission and use their “FTC Complaint Assistant” at FTC.gov. Please add "IRS Telephone Scam" to the comments of the complaint.

It is important to note that the IRS does not use email, text messages or any social media to discuss personal tax issue involving bills or refunds. For more information on reporting tax scams, go to www.irs.gov and type “scam” in the search box.

Additional information about tax scams is available on IRS social media sites, including YouTube http://www.youtube.com/irsvideos and Tumblr http://internalrevenueservice.tumblr.com, where people can search “scam” to find all the scam-related posts.