LAKEWOOD, Colo. — A sports fan's nightmare — your team makes the playoffs and in the game's final moments, your cable goes out. A Lakewood woman says that was just the start of her nightmare, and she wants Xfinity customers to hear her warning.
When the Nuggets aren't playing, Romaine Pacheco is watching the Warriors.
"It was the playoffs with two or three minutes left in the game," Pacheco said, recalling exactly what happened last Wednesday. "I'm sitting at my kitchen counter watching the game going, "Yay, Golden State," and the TV freezes."
The frozen TV set everything else into motion.
Pacheco says she called the number on her Xfinity technician's business card, and the person who answered did a system refresh.
"The TV's working! Great! And I say, "Thank you,"" said Pacheco. "Of course, the game is over by now. I don't know what the score is. "
Within moments, though, she says the score was the least of her worries. Her phone blew up with notifications showing thousands of dollars in payments to Xfinity.
Pacheco immediately alerted her bank.
"Every one of those payments that had been attempted to be pushed through my bank account, God bless BOK Financial, they refused payment on all of them," she said.
Xfinity's website warns about similar scams targeting customers, saying to be suspicious of anyone asking for personal account information or payments.
An Xfinity spokeswoman released this statement: "We’re sorry Ms. Pacheco was a victim of this phone scam. We’ve been in contact with her to ensure her account is now secure. As a reminder, Comcast will never ask customers for their password information over the phone, chat or email. Customers can check our Internet security alerts site for news, updates, and top phone scams, and to report abuse at https://internetsecurity.xfinity.com/help/alerts."
But Pacheco pointed out that her Xfinity account showed a $500,000 charge. She had to close her bank account and spend hours on the phone. She says she still doesn't know how this happened.
"I want other Xfinity customers to be aware that this can happen to you," Pacheco said. "Now, I am concerned that someone now has access to my cable system. Who can fix my cable television problem and not be an Xfinity representative?"
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