This comes at a time when first-class stamps have risen by 15p to £1.25, making large discounts on stamps tempting. Although the amount of letters being sent has decreased over the years, seven billion letters were handled by the Royal Mail between 2022 and 2023. Royal Mail estimates that it handles around 150 million cards during the Christmas period.
Scammers are claiming to sell a sheet of 80 second-class stamps for £60, but these phoney offers lead to phishing websites designed to steal your personal and financial information.
Read below to understand how to avoid and report this scam.
Stamp scams
A Facebook page titled ‘Royal Postal Mail’ promotes second class stamps as part of a ‘clearance sale for 3 days only’ and encourages you to ‘buy before the deadline’. The post also includes a link to theroyalmail.shop.
Which? found another website impersonating Royal Mail: theroaymailshop.shop.
The websites use Royal Mail branding, luring people in with tempting offers including ‘free shipping’ and ‘buy 4 get 20% off’.
These scam websites have an ‘about us’ page, fake reviews, a privacy policy and even contact information detailing the address of a Post Office shop.
Large discounts are advertised to lure you in, for example, a sheet of eight first class stamps is reduced from £100 to £49 and a sheet of 50 large second class stamps is discounted from £77.50 to £36.
Links on these scam websites to Royal Mail's social media accounts and a ‘track your order’ page either don't work or lead to fake accounts.
Where to buy stamps
The official Royal Mail website is www.royalmail.com.
Spotting and reporting scam posts and websites
Some signs that social media posts and websites are fraudulent include:
source https://www.which.co.uk/news/article/copycat-royal-mail-websites-flog-phoney-stamps-apw607z3CXO9