A repeat scam targeting owner-ops credibly impersonates a TQL rep offering a dedicated lane, but beware, it's a confirmed attempt to rob you Overdrive wrote about in March this year.
Owner-op Ilya Denisenko posted about the scam on Monday.
Denisenko was driving when he got a call that showed up on his phone as number he has saved for TQL.
Denisenko told Overdrive he uses TQL to find a backhaul here and there, about once a month, and that when you're on the app searching, it shows brokers your truck is available. It's pretty normal to get calls.
"I was driving at the time" the call came in, he said, "so I asked them to send the quote by email."
Right at the end of the call the voice on the other end mentioned a commission.
"Basically," the offer "seemed almost like an application," he said.
The voice on the phone told him: "You submit your info to shipper and if they approve it you get the contract, at that point there's a $1,100 commission, and that’s how it was with the contracts."
"That’s weird," thought Denisenko.
[Related: First load free? Owners share slick salesmanship tricks, broker icebreakers, more]
Oddly, the voice on the phone seemed to have studied up on Denisenko. The dedicated lane went from a town just down the road from his Tennessee home base to nearby Kentucky. The rates looked "kinda high, but it definitely wasn’t out of the question," he said.
When he finally got stopped to look at the email, his normal due diligence caught the scam.
"A few things were off. There definitely wasn’t a red flag, but a bunch of yellow flags," he said. The email initially looked legit, with the TQL logo and everything, but it's always smart to really poke around.
- The email came from [email protected]. A TQL rep would later tell him that TQL only sends emails from @TQL.com addresses.
- He looked up the number listed in the email and found it listed nowhere on TQL's site.
- Finally, his ear tipped him off about the initial call.
"Usually everyone at TQL or C.H. Robinson has zero accent," said Denisenko. "Really 99.9% have zero accent, but this person had an accent that was a tiny bit hard to understand."
But even if there were no other warning signs, Denisenko said he "pretty much always looks up" the name of a broker claiming to represent a company.
Smart move.
Overdrive reached out to TQL for the second time this year about such a scam. The impersonator using TQL's own phone number was a "verified scam attempt," the company said this time around. Any carriers that have had contact with them should "cease contact and proceed with blocking any associated contact information."
TQL "said it’s pretty common now actually," according to Denisenko.
[Related: Beware scammers posing as TQL, asking for money to obtain a dedicated lane: PSA]
Denisenko said he thought the scammer was simply after the $1,100 payment he asked for. But if he'd gone through with the payment, they'd have his tax ID number, LLC info, and everything else they might need to impersonate him on load boards or potentially even claim the business.
TQL, to it's credit, offered to set up a PIN number with him that TQL agents would always have to use in future communications.
Drivers, stay vigilant out there.
