Holiday Scam Alert: Check Your Order

One of the top holiday scams is an email or text that says “check your order”, “your order status”, “your order cannot be shipped”, “verify your order” or something similar, from businesses you are likely to shop, including Walmart, Costco, Amazon, Target and Walgreens, and also from FedEx, Microsoft and NetFlix.

Since more of us are ordering more online these days, especially for Black Friday and Cyber Monday deals, it is more important than ever to be vigilant about our online orders.

I’ve gotten dozens of fraudulent emails and texts recently from scammers recently, and probably you have, too.

The scammers know we’re all busy shopping online, so they are just as busy trying to scam us.

Many online scam emails come from websites based in Romania, Ukraine and other Eastern European countries. Or not. A growing number are from the USA.

I have received multiple scam emails to verify my recent renewal of Microsoft 365. I know they are scams because they come from unknown addresses.

They include – scam email from an address @findes.org.br and the exact same one from a .lb address. And another from @alfawaschools.com, and also from @zstepla.cz, from @allainjuniors.com and from @bereatech.co.za. They just keep coming.

So I have some questions –

Why is an address in Bulgaria – which is where .br is – emailing me about my Microsoft purchase?
Why is an address in Lebanon- which is where .lb is – emailing me about my Microsoft purchase?
Who the blazes is alfawaschools.com, and why are they emailing me to verify my Microsoft purchase?
Ditto allainjuniors.com. And from @bereatech.co.za – dot-za is South Africa.

I will keep adding them here as I get them, since all these emails are exactly the same, from different countries and websites, although they all arrived in my mailbox spoofed – as if they were from Microsoft, which obviously they aren’t – if they are coming from Bulgaria, Lebanon, and South Africa.

That means scammers on the Dark Web or other scammer resource are sharing the names and email addresses of Microsoft customers. How did they get them – and more importantly – why isn’t Microsoft doing more to monitor such scam emails trading on their good name?

I got a similar scam email about an order I never placed with Walmart from a scammer at US-based swbell.net.

And another scam email advising me to track my FedEx shipment from the domain signaturepoolsuk. No kidding.

Some guy named dfern@ sent me an email recently advising that I had authorized ten $100 Apple gift cards to him. Lucky him to think I would authorize $1,000 in gift cards to somebody I do not know.

A phone call to Apple,and an email to apple.com/legal has resolved that. Unfortunately, the scammer stole one hour of my life to ensure that Apple would not process the fraudulent claim.

A scam text I received recently told me my Google account has been locked, and to log into a specific website to unlock it. Of course, I have been able to access my Gmail account since getting the scam fraud text.

Another holiday email fraud is the “official” letter from Santa.

Of course, Santa works for relocationluxuryreferralservices.com – just one of the “official” letter from Santa offers I’ve received recently.

Again, I’ve gotten these from websites based in both Eastern and Western European countries, and from Asian-based URLs, as well as from with a dot-net or dot-com URL.

So there are hackers, scammers and phishers everywhere in the world.

Do Not Be Fooled By a Holiday Email or Text Scam

Here is the buyer beware advice to avoid having your identity stolen or malware placed on your computer from these phishing scams:

Know what email address you use for online orders, so you can recognize when a “check your order” email arrives in the wrong mailbox.

Set up a separate email address for online ordering, so you can recognize when a “check your order” email arrives in the wrong mailbox

Use only email servers that allow you to check the address of the sender, so you can recognize a scam or phishing email before you click on a link.

Recently, a friend of mine was scammed out of $900 by an email telling her I was out of town and could she pay a bill for me, and I would pay her back as soon as I returned from my trip.

She paid without noticing that the return address was .br – Bulgaria – and lost all her money.

Venmo and Zelle online payment scams to avoid

Do Not Click on a Link

All of these online scams rely on your trust – and your instinct to click on the link provided or phone number provided by the scammer to say NONO NO NO NONONO.

So don’t do it. Report it to your provider. Report it to the company which claims to have your order.

Before you respond to any “checking your order” or similar email, check the sending address, so you can recognize a scam or phishing email.

Check the ecoXplorer Frauds & Scams page

for more frauds and scams to avoid

Be a smart ecoXplorer this holiday season, and year-round.

Avoid frauds and scams and save the green in your wallet.

This was published in 2020 and updated annually, including for 2024.

ecoXplorer Evelyn Kanter is a journalist with 25+ years of experience as a newspaper and magazine writer, radio & TV news producer & reporter, and author of guidebooks and smartphone apps – all focusing on travel, automotive, the environment and your rights as a consumer.