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A check signed by US President Donald Trump landed in the mailbox of a retiree in Linz. What looks like a scam is actually real. And he is not the only “victim”.
3:59 pm, September 7, 2020
A puzzling US windfall recently fell on a series from Upper Austria: for example, a pensioner from Linz found a check for 1,200 US dollars (1,013.34 euros) in his mailbox, signed by US President Donald Trumpreported that ORF Radio OÖ Monday. TO Raiffeisen Upper Austria 63 checks of this type have already been cashed, 45 at the Sparkasse in Upper Austria.
“I open the mailbox and suddenly I see inside United States Treasury and a check for $ 1,200 with the dedication: Economic Impact Payment, President Donald J. Trump, “described a Linz-born in an interview with the ORF. The 73-year-old took the check to the bank. The bank reviewed it and he discovered that the check was actually from the United States government and three days later he had the money in his account.
Guess
But the pensioner does not know why he received the money. At first he thought it had something to do with the fact that he worked in the United States for two years in the 1960s, he said in an interview with ORF. But then his wife also received a check for $ 1,200 and was never in the United States.
If you get such a check, you can cash it, says Paul Kaiser from Raiffeisenlandesbank Oberösterreich. Theoretically, it would also be possible for the US government to demand the money back, according to the ORF report, but that’s highly unlikely due to high spending. According to experts, caution is always advised in such cases if you are asked to pay something in advance to get the money. At first it was not clear whether the phenomenon was purely Upper Austrian; however, based on the banks’ assessment, it was highly unlikely.
Possible data breach
The reason for the cash blessing could be a data breach with the US authorities. “There this message was sent to almost 1.1 million deceased American citizens”, suspects a connection Kaiser, “the Americans have already confirmed this great mishap.”
The US government recently sent checks to countless people, intended to help with the coronavirus crisis. US citizens with an annual salary of up to $ 75,000 received checks for $ 1,200 and working couples with salaries of up to $ 150,000 received checks for $ 2,400. Also, there was $ 500 per child. Payments to more than a million deaths were also made in error. Apparently, the Ministry of Finance and the tax authorities had not compared her data with the death reports of the social security authorities before sending the aid checks. The fact that the name of the president of the United States, Donald Trump, is printed on the checks, has drawn criticism.
