WXMI — There’s no doubt that the need for financial help in Gaylord is great as residents continue to clean up after a EF-3 tornado touched down there on Friday.
Already, fundraisers large and small have been popping up for locals. The Better Business Bureau warns though – if you are planning to make a donation, take a few extra minutes to know where it’s going.
“Sometimes these fundraisers may be run by scammers who are just trying to quickly take the money and run,” said Katie Grievous with the BBB. “We get excited we get this adrenaline rush. We want to act, and we want to act now. It's so important to take that deep breath, take a moment to make sure that everything is legitimate.”
Large organizations like the American Red Cross and the United Way, specifically the chapter in Otsego County, are always safe bets to make sure your money will go to causes on the ground in affected areas. But Grievous says scammers are known to dupe even the most legitimate groups and their websites to get a hold of your info.
“Make sure that if you are giving credit card information online, that you're on a secure server, it's going to have that little lock up at the top near where it says HTTPS,” said Grievous. “Those are little things that legitimate charities and legitimate organizations that collect money from you are going to have so just kind of pay attention to those small details.”
And when it comes to payment, Grievous recommends using a credit card. Most cards will have built in fraud protection and you’re much more likely to recoup funds from a scammer if you use a credit card versus using cash or check, or banking information.
For crowdfunding campaigns, like Kickstarter or Go Fund Me, Grievous recommends even more caution as those sites are vastly less regulated. She recommends verifying that the campaign host has a legitimate connection to the beneficiaries or the place they’re fundraising for and verifying whether the donation is for direct relief or supplies, and how the donations will be getting to people.
“What kind of donations are they taking? If they're taking money, what are they going to do with that money? Is that money going directly to victims? If so, how do they know those victims, how are they going to contact those victims to get that money to them? If it's going to go towards supplies, where are they getting those supplies from? And how are they going to get them there? Having those details is really important before you make those donations,” she said.
Already Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel has sent investigators to Gaylord to investigate reported instances of price gouging of essential services and repairs after last week’s tornado. Michigan does not have a law specifically prohibiting price gouging in direct response to a disaster, but Michigan law does prohibit any retailer from charging a price that is "grossly in excess of the price at which similar property or services are sold."
And don’t be fooled by images that look legitimate.
“Just because you see those key words like Gaylord and tornado, and you see a picture of damage, that doesn't necessarily mean that that picture is even from the area, that doesn't necessarily mean that people who are creating them know what's going on,” said Grievous. “They just take advantage, unfortunately, of the headlines, and this is a national story.”
