Category: Announcements

NatWest phishing scam:

Look out for a scam email that claims the phone number on your account has been changed.

Scammers are impersonating NatWest in phishing emails designed to scare recipients into handing over their bank details. 

These emails involve fraudsters attempting to deceive NatWest customers into entering their online banking login information on a dodgy website.

Amazon issues warning to customers amid growing threat of impersonation scams

Amazon says it has taken down thousands of phishing websites and dodgy phone numbers in an attempt to stop fraudsters in their tracks.

Scammers have repeatedly targeted Amazon, looking to deceive its customers via calls, texts and emails. We recently reported on Amazon Prime scam calls, where fraudsters persuaded victims into downloading software to give them access to their device.

NEVER DISCLOSE ANY DETAILS TO COLD CALLS / EMAILS

ALWAYS BEWARE, CRIMINALS LURK EVERYWHERE.

Welcome to our month of Bank Holidays

May 1^st is of course May Day, which used to be Labour Day and have parades.

May 6^th is of course when Charles gets crowned at his coronation as King Charles III.  There is a big council event happening on Titchfield Park from 10am to 4pm, with stalls of local activities, charities, food stalls and children’s activities in the afternoon.

There will also be a ‘Big Screen’ showing the coronation for those so inclined to want to come together and share in the event. The day promises to be a good day out and worthy of a visit.

May 8^th is an additional Bank Holiday to celebrate the coronation event.

May 29^th is of course called Spring Bank Holiday, and hopefully we will be sharing good sunny weather until the Autumn.

What a pity, we no longer have a Whitsuntide holiday, used to love my scout whit camps, always 6 weeks after Easter, first camp of the year.

As always, please book in at the desk on arrival and, as importantly for Health and Safety, ensure you sign yourselves out if leaving early.

Please try and wear your name badges and turn off or silence your mobiles during the meeting.

I am pleased to say that our Annual General Meeting went well, with all the proposals being passed, thanks to all who took part

I have now been our chairman for one year, only one more to go!! I have enjoyed it and yes, it is fairly hard work, having to sort out a lot of items and numerous emails,

Writing reports, agendas, attending meetings etc. what did we do before the internet?   I think life was a lot slower and possibly more enjoyable, especially for us ‘oldies’, not sure the younger generations would agree however.

The job of ‘chair’ is however, made so much easier having such a fantastic committee and social sub committee who do a magnificent job, so, many, many thanks to all, along with our editor and of course our new sub editor.

If you feel that you can be part of the committee, please enquire as to what it entails, as next year, we have several committee members coming to the end of their six year term and we cannot exist without certain officers in place.

Please don’t forget to volunteer for the tea and coffee rota, if we all volunteered, we would only have to do so every four years.

Look forward as always to meeting you all at May’s meeting.

Melvyn Francis, Chair

Turkey/Syria Earthquakes

Beware of fake donation accounts for the Turkey-Syria earthquake

If you’re considering donating to victims of the Turkey-Syria earthquake, keep in mind that scammers are always lurking to take advantage of such a crisis.

On social media, we’ve found pages, posts and videos containing misleading or false information about the earthquake. This is in an attempt to get people to send funds, including Bitcoin and NFT donations.

Phoney HMRC tax refund emails

Fraudsters are impersonating HMRC and sending phoney tax refund emails. The emails include a link to ‘claim’ your refund. And if you click on the link, you’ll be taken to a website that puts you at risk of giving away your personal details to a scammer.

It is helpful to know that HMRC will never send specific tax information (such as how much you owe or any rebates due to you) by email, so if you receive this email you can rest assured that it’s a scam.

Fake People’s Postcode Lottery letters

If you receive a letter claiming that you’ve won thousands in the People’s Postcode Lottery, it’s important to take a moment to ensure you’re not being targeted by a scammer.

This scam letter includes the People’s Postcode Lottery logo and branding and claims that your postcode has been randomly selected from the electoral roll database. You’re asked to call a number to claim your prize which is when the scammer will phish your personal details.

Amazon Prime scam

Scammers are impersonating Amazon to get access to your device.

These scam calls involve fraudsters telling consumers that their Amazon Prime subscription is increasing in price or expiring. If you say you want to cancel, you’ll be asked to download remote access software such as AnyDesk. This is a genuine program that fraudsters sometimes use to exploit victims. Once you download the program, the scammer will be able to access your device and steal your information or install malware.

ALWAYS BEWARE, CRIMINALS LURK EVERYWHERE.

Welcome to our website.  Thankfully warmer weather seems to be settling in, let’s hope we can turn the heating down and try and get back to some type of financial normality.

As always, please book in at the desk on arrival and as importantly for Health and Safety, ensure you sign yourselves out if leaving early.

Please try and wear your name badges and turn off or silence your mobiles during the meeting.

March has well and truly arrived with many relevant dates, the 1^st March is our committee meeting and St David’s Day for the Welsh among us and 17^th, St Patrick’s Day for our Irish members. The 14^th is the Ides of March, so beware if you have any Roman heritage!

For those of you still with mothers don’t forget the 19^th, which is Mothering Sunday. The 20^th is the Spring Equinox, also known as the Vernal Equinox, the official start of Spring, looking forward to all of the spring flowers and warmer weather to brighten up our lives. And of course, if out in the countryside watch out for those mad March hares! We have seen a few in the fields off Narrow Lane when walking the dogs.

Finally, don’t forget to put the clocks forward on Saturday night 25^th, as British Summer Time starts at 2.00am on Sunday 26^th. Often funny at church, as one or two families always forget and turn up at the end of the service.

Great to see so many at the February meeting, John and Christine Berrill having to put out additional cups. A big thank you to John and Chris for all their hard work every meeting.

For those renewing their membership at the meeting, I hope that you found our new card readers useful, we are hoping to make more use of them in the future to pay for our activities and reduce the amount of cash collected. Thanks to Gary our treasurer for sorting this out.

Don’t forget to buy your tickets for the Social Sub Committee’s next event, which is on 1^st April (no not an April Fools joke) ‘The Irish Night’ starring ‘Kelly’s Hero’s’, cost is only £8.00p, bring your own food and fancy dress is optional. Should be another great night. Again, special thanks to the SSC for all of their hard work and planning.

Look forward as always to meeting you all at March’s meeting.

Melvyn Francis, Chair

We held a meeting for Group Leaders at the end of February and our committee came along too.

We have 46 groups in our u3a, which are led by 36 people and the majority of them attended the meeting. They do a great job on our behalf, and this isn’t always an easy job.

We looked at the updated u3a ‘Guidance for Group Leaders’, with input from our Chairman, Membership Secretary, Business Secretary and Treasurer. Group Leaders were given the opportunity to ask questions on Membership, our u3a administration system (Beacon), Health and Safety and the Financing of groups.

We then divided into 5 groups to look at 6 hypothetical scenarios. They were based on potential problems that might occur in a group. They certainly created some lively discussion and as there was no right or wrong answer everyone took part!!

It was good to meet, and we plan to come together again in the summer.

Sue Tedstone (Groups’ Coordinator)