• Postmaster Gen. notes only prepaid or cash-on-delivery methods accepted 

In preventing the public from falling prey to scammers who misuse the name of the Postal/Posts Department, the most important step is educating the public, because it is due to the lack of awareness that the public lose their money to scammers, the Posts Department cautioned.

Speaking to The Daily Morning, Postmaster General Ruwan Sathkumara noted that even though several forms of awareness-raising activities have been conducted in light of the recent incidents of scams where the scammers had pretended to be the Department, more awareness-raising efforts are necessary, and that the general public should be targeted through these efforts. 

The scams in question involved sending a short messaging service (SMS) text message to individuals claiming that a package, which has been sent to them, has been withheld in the Department due to a payment related issue, and that these individuals could have the package delivered by paying the said balance amount. These SMSs direct the targeted individuals to a website, which was identical to the authentic website of the Department, in order to make the relevant payment online. A number of people had fallen prey to this scam, and social media platforms were flooded with those who had received such SMSs.

Sathkumara noted that the Department does not notify such issues via SMSs. Moreover, he stressed that the only modes of payment used by the Department are either pre-paid payment methods, where the applicable payment has been made in advance, or postpaid payment methods (also known as the cash-on-delivery method), where the applicable payment is made upon the receipt of the package. The Department, according to him, does not charge any other form of payment during the process of delivering a package.

As the said scam was revealed, the Department has sought the assistance of the Police Information Technology Unit and also of the Sri Lanka Computer Emergency Readiness Team. It has also been reported that several websites used for the scam have been banned.

According to Sathkumara, the Police investigations into the scam are still ongoing.