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Online security and order delivery advice

Thursday, 1st December 2022

Christmas is one of the busiest times of the year for mail-order and online businesses like ourselves and with that comes a massive increase in parcel deliveries. Sadly, this provides an ideal opportunity for the more unscrupulous to produce scam communications, impersonating courier companies in an effort to gain access to your personal data.

Online securityThere are many ways to spot fake emails - such as keeping an eye out for poor graphics, bad spelling, incorrect information and matching the sender’s name and email address - but spammers are getting more and more sophisticated so we would offer the following advice when you get an email concerning a delivery:
  • As a general rule, do not click any links on an email you have even the slightest inkling may not be genuine – to check the status of your order, go direct to the seller or courier either via their website or over the phone. In our case, you can contact us via info@russandrews.com or by phone on 01539 797300.
  • One way to ensure order update emails from Russ Andrews are genuine is to check that the order number quoted in the email matches yours – all our despatch emails will include your order number which begins ‘WEB’ for web orders and ‘SO’ for phone orders.
  • At present, we do not send texts, so any text message purporting to be directly from Russ Andrews will not be genuine. However, you may receive a text message about your order from one of our couriers: ParcelForce, Royal Mail, UPS, UK Mail or DHL. Again, don’t assume these are genuine just because the timing is right.
  • Keep a note of the tracking number you were sent by us in the original despatch email; you can copy and paste this number into the tracking page on the courier’s website to get accurate details on the status of your order.
  • Spammers send out millions of emails knowing that there will be a significant number of recipients who are expecting a parcel, so don’t assume the email is genuine just because the timing happens to coincide with an expected order.
  • Don’t be fooled by a sense of urgency, for example telling you that you must contact the courier to avoid your order being returned to the sender.
  • One scam technique is to say that you can upgrade your courier service by giving your card details and paying an extra charge – we will never ask you for any financial details in our emails.
  • It’s not just emails; scammers have also been known to post ‘sorry we missed you’ type cards through letterboxes saying a delivery has been attempted and to ring a number or go to a website to rearrange. Again, if in doubt, contact the retailer who supplied the parcel you are expecting via a means you know to be reliable. For example, if you are expecting a delivery from Russ Andrews, contact us via our website or phone us on 01539 797300.
Scammers tend to target big-name companies’ customers such as Apple, so it’s far less likely you would receive a scam email quoting Russ Andrews. However, you may receive a message quoting one of our couriers, so it’s good practice to follow the above guidelines as a matter of course.

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Comments


reviewed by Simon Welbourn
27 Dec 2021
"Ra Look After Us"
Simon's advice on delivery scams is really helpful and indicative of the superb customer service which RA always have in the forefront of their business model. Thank you.
Customer Service Reply Thank you Simon - glad it was of use.

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