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Personal Training Account (CPF): how to recognize and thwart scams?

Since the establishment of the Personal Training Account, scams have multiplied. In two years, 16 million euros have been embezzled according to the Caisse des Dépôts. While waiting for the implementation of a law prohibiting telephone canvassing in connection with the CPF, here are some tips to avoid falling into the trap of crooks.

cpf board scam recognize to play

You certainly know the Personal Training Account (also called CPF). Set up by the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations on January 1, 2019, this mechanism replaces the DIF. It allows you to accumulate funds that can be used to pay for training. This money comes from businesses through employer contributions. There are tens of thousands of training courses available that you can choose from, depending on your sandstone, your professional project and your budget. All those which are approved are available from this interface.

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The limit for this account is 5000 euros. According to the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations, the average sum of an account is 1,573 euros. It doesn’t mean much said like that. But all French assets have an account. Or 38 million accounts for an amount bordering on … 60 billion euros. It is a beautiful sum of money which obviously attracts greed.

First there are the crooks. They develop companies that pass themselves off as training organizations to siphon CPF from victims. Then there are the profiteers. These are real training organizations that forcefully enroll certain people in their training courses to pocket the money. According to the daily Free noon, the Caisse des Dépôts affirms that 16 million euros were thus embezzled in 2020 and 2021. 5,000 fraud reports were made and 14,300 accounts were victims of fraud.

A law amendment should be proposed to the National Assembly to prohibit telephone canvassing in connection with the CPF. While waiting for it to appear in the official journal, it is important to guard against this scam. In this article, we offer you important information and useful actions to adopt to avoid any mishap.

How to recognize a scam that targets your CPF?

cpf board scam recognize to play
Credit: Unsplash

Here are some tips to help you recognize a scam:

  • No official body concerned by the CPF does not approach employees by telephone. Whether it is the Pôle Emploi, the Caisse des Dépôts et Consignation, or the Ministry of Labor, Employment and Integration. If you receive an SMS or a phone call, it is a scam or scam.
cpf board scam recognize to play
A Montpellier woman testifies on Twitter of the number of spam emails received by SMS. Credit: Audrey Brahimi @ Twitter
  • None of the organizations mentioned above will ask you to take any action for the sake of a message on social networks or by email. This is a phishing attempt.
  • A scammer will always ask you for personal information allowing access to your CPF account. This is usually your social security number (which serves as an identifier to connect to the site Moncompteformation) and your associated password. In particular, it is your password that interests him the most.
  • If you are not comfortable with the computer tool, the scammer offers to help you by helping you reset your lost password, or to create your account if you haven’t already done so. No official body linked to the CPF will offer you to take control of your personal account.
  • You can also recognize a scam by certain marketing arguments. If the advisor tells you a deadline from which you lose your capital, you are well facing a scam. This is not the case. The only limit is the threshold of 5,000 euros cumulative. In addition, the hours accumulated on the DIF are automatically transformed. There is no need for an online advisor to do this manually.

How to thwart a CPF scam and what to do if you are the victim?

Here are some good practices to avoid falling into the trap (and some reflexes to adopt if you are a victim).

  • If you are the subject of a telephone canvassing campaign for training with your CPF, we advise you to end the phone conversation. Simply. You can also place the phone number in your blocking filter (available on both iOS and Android).
  • If politeness prevents you from hanging up on the agent, pay attention to do not disclose any personal information. In particular your login details to access your CPF account.
  • If you have received an SMS asking you to connect to your CPF account, there is no need to reply. And especially, do not click on a link in the message. It will most likely be a phishing site aimed at collecting your personal data. You can just delete it. As with phone calls, numbers sending spam by SMS can be blocked by the filter.
  • If number filtering is tedious, because crooks change numbers regularly, you have two more comprehensive solutions. The first is toactivate blocking of all unknown numbers. Note that this also potentially blocks those of friends who have changed their phone number …
  • The second solution is to use Bloctel, an official service of the French government. This is a list of “opposition to canvassing”. If you are on this list, any telemarketing platform is prohibited from contacting you. The lease is free. It lasts 3 years. And it renews itself manually. To access it, go to Bloctel.gouv.fr.
cpf board scam recognize to play
  • You can report the phone number (s) used to contact you. To do this, all you have to do is use the SMS service ” 33700 “. If it is SMS spam, it should be forwarded to this number. If it is a voice call, send the word ” Spamvocal »Followed by the number of the issuer at 33700. The service is free in most plans.
  • Even if the advisor already has your last name, first name, telephone number and social security number, this information does not allow them to access your CPF. The right reflex is to never transmit the password.
  • Scammers can also hack your account because it is not sufficiently protected. The rules for a strong password are: at least 8 characters, at least one uppercase, at least one number and at least one special character.
  • If you think you have been scammed, log into your CPF and change your password. If you cannot access it because the hacker changed the credentials, you can reset the password over the phone. The number is 0970823551.
  • Logging in to the site allows you to change the password, but also to check your training balance. If you have been forcibly registered for training, take screenshots, save all available information and report the case to the site Moncompteformation. If your account has been emptied, it is a scam. You must then file a complaint with the gendarmerie.

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