– Hey, everyone. Well, I heard something interesting on the radio today, and it's that people are being scammed by someone calling from the IRS and claiming that there are police officers in their neighborhood and if they don't pay their, delinquent taxes that the cops are going to come pick them up. The IRS's alleged method of payment to settle your outstanding tax debts are none other than iTunes gift cards. So, anyway, wouldn't you know that a couple hours after I heard that, that I got a call. You need to call this number back now. This is very serious or whatever. So that's exactly what I'm going to do. So let's see what the IRS has to say.

– [Man] Thank you for calling Internal Revenue Service. How can I help you?

– Hi, um, I got a message about my taxes or something?

– [Man] Yes, sir. Can I have your name first of all?

– My name?

– [Man] Yes.

– Oh. Well, wouldn't you know my name, sir?

– [Man] No sir, I have lots of names in the system, right? Can you provide me your first name, last name so I am able to pull up your records in our system and I'll let you know what's going on and what's this all about, okay?

– Sure. My name is Jack Johnson.

– [Man] And sir, which number you receive a call from the IRS? On your cell phone number or your work phone number or your home phone number.

– Um, my, it was my cell phone number.

– [Man] And what did you say your phone number, sir?

– Okay, um. Well, it's tricky. I'm not, I'm not sure which number it was called on because I use several numbers on my cellphone using different apps. Okay, so the person actually hung up on me which I felt was kind of rude.

So I'm gonna call him back. Now I should've had something to give them. I should've thought ahead, like a better name. Or a phone number. It would make sense that they would ask for that, so if they do answer I'm going to give them the Kansas City IRS phone number, so. Anyway, let's call 'em up again, see if they'll answer. And what do you know, I guess they're out of business.

Okay, now some quick tips if you are ever called by the IRS.

First of all, the IRS typically will send you correspondence via mail to let you know that you owe a debt.

If they ever do call you, they will not demand that you make payment via some specific means like a debit card or a credit card or something like that.

And they will never have you make payment to an entity other than the US Treasury.

Even if they're collecting a debt, they will still demand payment to the US Treasury, and they will never threaten to send police officers, immigration officers, whatever, to your house if you don't make payments.

So if you ever don't know what to do, hang up the phone and call a local CPA and let them be the trusted liaison between you and the IRS.

Don't get scammed.