Telephone fraudsters hit expats with demands for visa cash

Dozens of foreigners who have come to the Netherlands to work have been the victims of internet fraudsters who pretend to be workers from the immigration service IND, the Volkskrant says on Tuesday.

In some cases, the expat is told there are problems with their residency permits and they will be removed from the country unless they pay up. In others, they have simply been told they will have to leave, the paper says.

The criminals appear to have detailed information about the person they are calling, including the passport number.  Indian national Gaurav Arora, 32, who is a project manager for a major Dutch electronics company, was told there were problems with his visa. The ‘civil servant’ sounded convincing, he said.

‘He knew my email address, the date I came to the Netherlands and my passport number,’ Arora told the Volkskrant. ‘He also started talking about my wife’s visa which is when I really got worried.’

Expat website

Arora was asked to send some information via an ‘IND expat website’, but eventually became suspicious. He asked the caller to send an official email to him and his boss and then heard nothing more.

A spokesman for the IND said he did not know how the crooks got hold of the information but said it unlikely to have come from the IND’s own files.

The IND has refused to state if anyone has paid money to the fraudsters but has opened a helpline for people who think they have fallen victim to the trick: 08804 – 30470.

Immigration lawyer Jelle Kroes told the Volkskrant the IND is sloppy about verifying the identity of callers. ‘If I phone on behalf of a client, no one usually checks if I have the right to do this. It is easy to abuse this situation.’

Have you been a victim of this type of fraud. Contact editor@dutchnews.nl