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Scammed by a fake UA call center {Consoldiated}

Scammed by a fake UA call center {Consoldiated}

Old Feb 20, 2019, 8:28 pm
  #136  
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Originally Posted by j2simpso
....
But can UA do anything about it for this traveller? Can they give them a new password (i.e. PNR) and invalidate the prior one? ....
UA can do a few things It has been reported you can call and request a codeword for a particular reservating -- restricting access to live agents who will request the codeword before any changes.
Also, I beleive a supervisor can move the itin to a new PNR.

Last edited by WineCountryUA; Feb 20, 2019 at 8:40 pm Reason: wrong word
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Old Feb 20, 2019, 8:28 pm
  #137  
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Originally Posted by jsloan
If you were to do that, you would be representing yourself as your agent to UA. If your question is, "does UA policy allow people to make changes based upon a misrepresentation," the answer is obviously 'no.' But since the policy isn't enforced on the website, I'm not sure what good that really does you.
All it takes is a discarded barding pass and someone can truly screw your travel plans up.
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Old Feb 20, 2019, 8:36 pm
  #138  
 
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Originally Posted by WineCountryUA
UA can do a few things It has been reported you can call and request a codeword for a particular reservation -- restriction answer to live agents who will request the codeword before any changes.
Also, I beleive a supervisor can move the itin to a new PNR.
I suspect it would make the most sense for OP to get their res moved to a new PNR (if at all possible). Part of me thinks that if the scammers are going to do any scamming with the itinerary they would do it all online without having to speak with a living breathing agent. If that were the case (and knowing the limitations of UA's IT ) I would suspect that the codeword may not appear if the scammer tried accessing the res with the PNR.

That being said, if the OP could report back as to whether UA has the capability to move the res to a new PNR it would be appreciated as I suspect this knowledge would be helpful in the future in a variety of circumstances.

Safe Travels,

James
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Old Feb 20, 2019, 8:42 pm
  #139  
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Originally Posted by j2simpso
.... I would suspect that the codeword may not appear if the scammer tried accessing the res with the PNR. ,,,,
Belleive codewording the itin disables online change access -- which creates it own issues
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Old Feb 20, 2019, 9:25 pm
  #140  
 
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Originally Posted by Xyzzy
All it takes is a discarded barding pass and someone can truly screw your travel plans up.
or, more likely, a social media post that shows a confirmation number. people are incredibly naive/reckless with that sort of information these days.

OP, please relay as much of this info as possible to UA corporate security. i'd mail print-outs of everything you have, simply because i don't trust that an outsourced CSR will successfully relay your info to WHQ.
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Old Feb 20, 2019, 10:37 pm
  #141  
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Has anyone else tried calling the number the OP shared? I was looking forward to having a little bit of fun at the scammers expense. But alas, the number is busy
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 8:23 am
  #142  
 
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I don't know if you covered this yet, but I would advise you to cancel your credit card and get a new number + change as much access to your UA account /security questions as you can. These shady companies probably store all this information and would sell it to the black market if they could. Anyway, chase is pretty cooperative in my experience with shady practice companies - they usually make me feel like they are on my side. Good luck and thanks for the info - I google phone numbers all the time and this post has made me realize my potential issues in the future!
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 8:59 am
  #143  
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Originally Posted by zrs70
Has anyone else tried calling the number the OP shared? I was looking forward to having a little bit of fun at the scammers expense. But alas, the number is busy
Both OP and several others have pointed out that the number has been disconnected.

Scammers also collect inbound call numbers and use those as "live" for future scams. Unless you are lonely and want calls from scammers on a regular basis, it's not a good idea to engage any of them.
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 9:15 am
  #144  
 
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Originally Posted by jiajun
Yes, it's possible to do it. But is it allowed by UA policy?
Not only allowed but required if I want to use one of my certificates against a family member's flights. For practical purposes, I could provide family with my account number and password and let them do it themselves but 1) I don't give anyone my passwords, even family and 2) doing that is a breach of TOS. Any time I call the travel agency or UA themselves to change my travel, I have to provide the booking code.

Originally Posted by J S
This is a very helpful, but please edit your post to remove at least a digit or two of the scammer's phone number. Otherwise, it is possible that someone could accidentally use that number through a mistaken google search or google could actually increase the ranking of that number.

Moderators: perhaps you can make the edit.

I would leave most of the number (just star out a digit or two) so that people will be able to recognize the number is fake if they were trying to check it.
I would note that archives of past conversations helped me out when I was stranded in Singapore Airport. I had to call UA to get my travel reinstated due to missing my connection (forest fires in Sumatra closed 4 or 5 of their airports) and my cell phone wasn't working in the airport. The only way I was finally able to contact UA without leaving the airport and entering Singapore was to search online for a non-toll-free phone number for UA customer service and I found it in archived chats (probably FlyerTalk itself although I don't remember that detail).

Last edited by WineCountryUA; Feb 21, 2019 at 1:33 pm Reason: merging consecutive posts by same member
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 9:17 am
  #145  
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Originally Posted by ExplorerWannabe
The only way I was finally able to contact UA without leaving the airport and entering Singapore was to search online for a non-toll-free phone number for UA customer service
For future reference, both Skype and Google Talk allow calls to US toll-free numbers at no charge. You can reach the main UA numbers anywhere you can find WiFi access.

And, for that matter, the number to call is (800) UNITED-1 -- (800) 864-8331. Just in case someone does come across this thread and needs it.
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 9:41 am
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Originally Posted by jsloan
For future reference, both Skype and Google Talk allow calls to US toll-free numbers at no charge. You can reach the main UA numbers anywhere you can find WiFi access.

And, for that matter, the number to call is (800) UNITED-1 -- (800) 864-8331. Just in case someone does come across this thread and needs it.
Thanks but at the time, I didn't have Skype on my laptop and I do as little as possible through Google. Only recourse I had was the payphone by the food court and of course I couldn't call a US toll free number from there. Credit card charge was minor pain but but much better than being stuck in the airport without a boarding pass or having to exit the airport to go down to United's booking office without any assurance of re-entry.
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 11:03 am
  #147  
 
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Originally Posted by ExplorerWannabe
Only recourse I had was the payphone by the food court and of course I couldn't call a US toll free number from there.
You could have if you'd kept the little wallet-sized call guide you get with your 1K package each year... (Presuming you were 1K at the time)
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 5:48 pm
  #148  
 
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Originally Posted by riphamilton
or, more likely, a social media post that shows a confirmation number. people are incredibly naive/reckless with that sort of information these days.
Some hide the number but keep the barcode intact, which allows the PNR to be derived. Or they hide part of the barcode not realizing that the barcode has correction/replication still allowing the PNR to be derived if it is partly unreadable.

Also, give me an hour at any airport, and I'll come back to you with at least 10 different paper boarding passes that were abandoned.

Then again, a whole worldwide industry has relied for decades on the simple LAST NAME/PNR combo, and changing that would have enormous complications, costs millions of dollars and take months if not years.

Originally Posted by riphamilton
OP, please relay as much of this info as possible to UA corporate security. i'd mail print-outs of everything you have, simply because i don't trust that an outsourced CSR will successfully relay your info to WHQ.
I've become more and more convinced "Corporate Security" doesn't do much as long as it's not something that costs the company money (not specifically UA). Here you could argue UA's reputation is on the line, but is it really, and would that keep people from flying with UA, and is it worth it to go after a scammer in a foreign untouchable country vs going after hidden city violations and certs bartering?
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 6:04 pm
  #149  
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Originally Posted by COSPILOT
For kicks I called the number OP provided but its no longer in service. Total scam. I have zero tolerance for crap like this and have no issue using every resource to see people like this brought to justice.
You're not the only one!
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Old Feb 21, 2019, 6:11 pm
  #150  
 
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TBH I think the real culprit here is not so much the travel agency but rather Alphabet Inc., willing to take a quick buck without concerns of having their users scammed because they know those users can't avoid Google in the future.

I do not believe this travel agency popped up above UA in the organic search results. It did so in the paid ads results, which appear on top of the organic results.

Google did have the chance to not accept this ad for this specific search query, instead, Google happily pocketed the money and placed the clearly misleading search result on top of the legitimate search results when their user relied on them for accurate information, enabling the scammers in what they do.

I highly doubt this is the first documented case, and I highly doubt Google isn't aware that it is happening.
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