Singaporean allegedly scammed into buying S$179 fire extinguisher by salesman

SINGAPORE — On Sunday (Feb 16), a concerned citizen took to Facebook group All Singapore Stuff to report a suspicious incident involving an alleged “fire extinguisher” scammer.

The person who posted about the incident, who was identified as Kelvin, told the group that his mother was informed by a company going by the name of “Fire Safety & Prevention (SG)” that “all HDB flats must have fire extinguishers installed by 2020 April”.

The salesman went on to add that the company had an ongoing promotion of one can of fire extinguisher for just S$17.90.

Kelvin’s mum, who is in her 60s, was also told that they would not accept cash but that payment through a Nets machine was possible.

When the woman keyed in the transaction in the machine, she suddenly noticed that the invoice read S$179 and not S$17.90.

By then, the transaction had been made, noted Kelvin, and the salesperson—identified as “Than”—said that the higher price was for a 10-year contract.

“I felt it’s a misleading/scam case,” said Kelvin. “We have filed a police report, as for now.”

Kelvin shared photos of the official receipt given to his mum by the salesman:

In anticipation of questions as to why his mum went ahead with the purchase, Kelvin added that his mum is elderly, doesn’t know English, cannot see very well and was coerced into a “fear of loss” state, which Kelvin said “indirectly compelled her to make the purchase”.

He noted that when he and siblings got home, it was too late to reverse his mum’s mistake in making the purchase.

Kelvin ended his post by saying that “it is a S$179 dollars lesson learnt, and I hope this would save and help everyone falling to such scams”.

You can check out his post here:

In the comments section, a fellow netizen posted a link to a previously shared post on the same group page, but from July 2019:

If it looks familiar to you, it’s because the receipt has nearly the same look, font and logo as the one given to Kelvin’s mum.

Let’s compare them side by side:

The post brought “attention and alertness” about the “sales scam” which happened in Punngol in July 2019.

The post stated that one of their friends was cheated by a sales agent claiming to be from the Singapore Fire Prevention company. Like with Kelvin’s mum, the customer was sold a fire extinguisher for S$179.

The salesman allegedly claimed that there was a fire accident in a nearby HDB block. He also claimed to be working for HDB and reiterated that it was mandatory to have fire extinguishers on hand.

The seller could not be contacted and blocked the communication channel.

“All these are completely fake and this is one of the biggest sales scam,” wrote the netizen who shared the post. “My friend has already [filed] a police complaint and I am writing here to alert [people]. Alleged scam. Take note.”

No information has been provided since, but both Kelvin and the other individual who posted about the scam  have reported the incidents to the police. /TISG