Weld Community Credit Union

As the coronavirus pandemic continues to sweep across the planet, the race to find a cure has taken on desperate urgency. Pharmaceutical companies and researchers around the world are scrambling to find a way to stop the virus and to immunize people against becoming infected.

Unfortunately, scammers have recognized an opportunity to rob innocent victims of their money while giving them false hope for defeating the virus. The FBI is warning of a surge in COVID-19 cure scams in which criminals peddle an alleged vaccine or treatment for coronavirus. Scammers are also claiming they can disinfect a home and all surfaces against the lingering virus after a family member was infected.

“The last thing the American people need, in the middle of this pandemic, is criminals trying to take advantage of them and profit off their concerns,” FBI Director Chris Wray said.

Here’s all you need to know about these scams.

How the Scams Play Out

There are several variations of coronavirus cure scams, most of which profit off the fear and panic of those who are already infected by COVID-19 and people who are fearful of contracting the virus.

One such scam involves a bogus website allegedly selling a vaccine against the novel coronavirus. In one instance, during the last weekend of March, 2020, a federal court ordered the shutdown of a website, “CornavirusMedicalKit.com.” The spammy site offered visitors a vaccine kit to protect against the coronavirus for just a nominal shipping fee of $4.95.

“In fact, there are currently no legitimate COVID-19 vaccines and the WHO (World Health Organization) is not distributing any such vaccine,” the Justice Department said about the website.

In another scam, victims receive a phone call in which a recorded voice offers to send them a free testing kit for the coronavirus. The victim need only pay the shipping charges for these testing kits — which, of course, are worthless. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) released several samples of these calls to raise awareness and alert the public about their circulation.

In yet another scam, bogus cleaning agencies advertise about their disinfecting and sanitizing services, claiming they can eradicate the virus from patients’ homes.

“For only $79 our highly trained technicians will do a full air duct cleaning and sanitation to make sure that the air you breathe is free of bacteria,” a voice on one of these calls says.

Unfortunately, after making a payment for the service, the victim will never hear from the agency again. In another variation, the “cleaning agency” will show up at the victim’s home, and perform a rudimentary cleaning using a simple solution of ordinary soap and water, which does little to disinfect against a lingering virus.

How to Spot the Scams

The coronavirus cure scams are fairly easy to spot. With just a bit of awareness and the knowledge of some basic information about COVID-19, you can recognize a scam and keep yourself safe from being victimized.

First, as mentioned, there is currently no approved vaccine or cure for the novel coronavirus. When a vaccine and cure do become available, it will likely make national headlines. You won’t first hear of it through a robocall. If a company reaches out to you trying to sell you a vaccine or cure, you’re likely looking at a scam. Hang up and don’t engage further.

Similarly, there are no FDA-approved at-home tests for the coronavirus available for the public. If a company tries to sell you one, it is likely a bogus test that won’t tell you if you’re actually infected by the virus or not.

Finally, if you or a member of your family has tested positive for COVID-19 and you’d like to sanitize your home from all traces of the virus, there’s no need to call a cleaning agency. You can do it yourself by following the CDC’s guidelines for disinfecting your home and all surfaces from the virus.

Don’t let the pervading fear and uncertainty of the coronavirus pandemic get your guard down. Arm yourself with the information you need to recognize potential coronavirus scams, and keep yourself aware and alert at all times. Stay safe!

The coronavirus pandemic has taken the world as we know it and turned it upside down. Hospitals are scrambling to meet the needs of their patients as the federal and local governments are issuing stricter guidelines to help stop the spread of the virus.

Shopping malls that were filled with crowds just a week ago now stand vacant. Universities and schools have emptied out and students are continuing their education online to diminish the spread of the virus. Small businesses have shuttered their doors as they choose their health and the health and safety of their customers over profit.

As part of this upheaval, millions of Americans have been sent home from work with laptops in hand and strict instructions to remotely tend to their usual workload. Unfortunately, this can prove to be a lot harder than it sounds. If you find yourself struggling to complete your workload from home during the outbreak, we can help!

Here are some tips on how to stay focused, on-task and productive as you work from home.

Create a workstation.

Propping up your pillows and working in bed can sound like a good idea until you find yourself nodding off in front of your computer screen. To keep your brain focused and in “working mode,” it’s best to designate one area of your home to serve as your workstation as you wait out the outbreak. Keep the area clean and stocked with all the supplies you may need during your work hours.

Set your hours.

A major boon of working from home is choosing your own hours — but this can backfire quickly. Lack of a proper schedule is the biggest enemy of the procrastinator. To keep from finding yourself with a huge amount of work to complete in an impossibly short amount of time, set up working hours and stick to them. If there are children home with you, work around their routine by scheduling your work hours during naptime or late at night when they’re asleep.

Collaborate.

For most of us, home is where we unwind and kick off our shoes after a long day of work. Keeping focused and staying on task when working in your own comfortable surroundings can be super-challenging. Bring home some of the motivational work atmosphere by collaborating with your colleagues as much as possible. Utilize video conferencing to swap ideas, plan long-term projects and communicate on platforms like Slack, which is created just for this purpose.

Get rid of all distractions.

It can be hard to keep your mind on work when each beep of the phone brings more horrific news and updates about the spread of the coronavirus. If you can, hide or shut off your phone during your work hours. If that’s not possible, consider turning off your notifications and social media apps. You can also use an app, like ColdTurkey, which makes it easy to minimize distractible apps and websites on your phone.

Your Turn: Are you working from home? Tell us how you’re making it work in the comments.

After careful consideration, and to ensure the health and wellbeing of our employees, members and communities we serve, the lobby is closed to walk-in, drive-up is still open effective March 20th 2020.  You may talk with us at 970-330-9728 Monday through Friday, 9:00 am to 5:15 pm. Please be patient with our staff who are working hard to serve everyone in these extraordinary circumstances. Call wait times will be longer than usual as more people call in, and so we thank you in advance for helping us to cheerfully serve you.

Teller Services

Our drive-up remains open for Teller Services Monday-Friday 7am to 5:30pm and 9am to 12pm Saturdays

Account Services

Account Service remains available Monday-Friday 9 to 5:30 pm, at 970-330-9728, in the Drive-Up, or by email admin@weldccu.com

Lending

We are still busy lending!  For loans you may talk with a loan officer at 970-330-9728 Monday through Friday, 9:00 am to 5:15 pm, start the process online at www.weldccu.com, or email admin@weldccu.com

Mobile Banking, Online Banking, and ATM network

ATM, Mobile App, and Online Banking systems are available 24 hours per day. Last year we added mobile deposit to the mobile app for your convenience. Now is the perfect time to download the free app from the App Store or Goggle Play Store, or enroll in online banking. Please update your email address and phone number with us if either has changed.

Telephone Teller

For account information, you may call DataCheck at 877-946-9728 around the clock

Members Annual Meeting, Shred Event, and Members Appreciation Day

Coronavirus led us to cancel the Members Annual Meeting and use an online method.  We also had to cancel the Shred Event and Members Appreciation Day, but we still would like to get together at some point in the fall.  Please watch the monthly newsletter for announcements, in case we are able to do something this fall.

Watch out for Fraud

As a reminder, under no circumstance will we call you and ask for your social security number, user name, password or PIN. Be aware that criminals may use this time to scam people. If you receive a call from anyone asking for this information, even if it appears to be from our credit union, do not provide it. Criminals are able to make our phone number appear on your caller ID even though it is not us calling. 

If you call us; however, then we will ask account identifying information.

Alternately, if you receive a text, email or phone call from our fraud center asking to verify purchases, please do respond.  They will simply ask you ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to verify purchases, and in doing you so, you will allow your card to remain active. You will know it is our Fraud center contacting you because they won’t ask for information beyond verifying ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to transactions, and you should not provide any information beyond that.

Fully Insured Funds and Highly Rated

Rest assured knowing your accounts at Weld Community Credit Union are safe and secure.  Not only are we Federally insured by the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) up to $250,000, we also have deposit insurance with Excess Share Insurance (ESI) that increases account deposit insurance coverage to double the NCUA limit, resulting in combined deposit insurance up to $500,000.  Weld Community Credit Union is financially strong, and we are recognized with a five-star rating by Bauer Financial .

Thank you for being a member and rest assured we are monitoring and adapting to this situation as needed. We will take every measure to limit the impact on our employees, members and help stop the spread of Coronavirus in the community.

Dave

Dave Brown
CEO

Weld Community
Credit Union