A Gariahat resident who was trying to book hotel rooms in Puri after calling a phone number she found during an internet search was allegedly duped out of around Rs 1 lakh.
The complainant, in her 50s, lodged a complaint with Gariahat police station on Saturday stating that she had come across a phone number while running an internet search for a particular hotel in Puri and dialled it to book rooms online.
“According to the complaint, the person who answered the call introduced himself as a staff member of the hotel. He told the resident of Fern Road that for booking rooms, she needed to pay an advance of Rs 12,000 online,” said an officer at Gariahat police station.
The complainant, who wanted to book rooms for eight persons, including herself, for a trip from February 2 to 5, made the payment online as told.
“She was given an account number, where the complainant transferred the money. The account is in a bank in Puri,” said the officer.
After that, the woman was told that she needed to be a “registered customer” for the booking to be confirmed.
“The fraudsters made several false claims and persuaded the complainant to part with Rs 84,246 in two instalments. The second instalment was transferred to an account in a bank in Odisha’s Khurda district,” the officer said.
The man who introduced himself as an employee of the hotel tried to convince the complainant to make yet another payment, but the woman got suspicious and refused to transfer any more money.
“She did not make any more payments and disconnected the call. But by then she had lost more than Rs 96,000,” said an officer of the cybercrime cell of the south-east division of Kolkata police.
This was only the latest in a series of complaints from Kolkatans who were duped while trying to book hotel rooms in Puri after calling numbers they had come across during an internet search.
In March, a woman who was planning a family vacation came across a phone number during an internet search that was shown to be the number of a hotel in Puri and was duped into clicking a link sent to her on WhatsApp. The woman, a resident of Muchipara, had lost Rs 96,000.
In October, a Tiljala resident had come across a phone number on the internet and called it to book a hotel room in Puri for a family trip. He was sent a QR code, scanning which he lost Rs 10,000.
“Fraudsters are often targeting people trying to book rooms in Puri hotels. We always advise people against clicking links from unverified sources or calling numbers found during online search. One must book rooms through the official website of the hotel,” said an officer.