Holiday Spending Tips

Are you looking to avoid the holiday spending hangover?

We’ve got some tips to help.

  • Start a Holiday Spending Plan - This should be created a few months in advance. Take into account existing expenses and bills as well as any additional spending for the holidays.

  • Develop the Holiday Budget - The budget should have line items for everyone who is receiving a gift and the amount of that gift. It should also include decorations like a Christmas tree, wrapping paper and ornaments. Other costs to remember are holiday food, travel, cards and postage.

  • Be Resourceful - If some of the line items are above your budget, consider being creative. Instead of traditional snail mail cards, you can email cards. Picking names for one or two gifts could help reduce overall expenses. Give time like running errands, babysitting, or gardening. It would be more personal and a bit cheaper.

  • Other Ways to Save - For holiday meal planning, potluck and bring your own beverages can help save some money. Also use coupons and pre-holiday specials to reduce costs. Look for those free shipping days if shopping online.

  • Prepare for Next Year - Open up a Holiday Club where you can contribute weekly, bi-weekly or monthly is a great way to save and budgeting will be a little easier. Even $25 every other week would be a great starting point.

Be aware of these holiday fraud trends…

Fraudsters have their own traditions during the holidays that usually involve some festive twists on some tried-and-true scams and schemes. These threats are often layered and involve multiple fraud tactics and technologies to execute. Beware of this year’s holiday fraud trends:

  • Holiday Malvertising - Malvertising, or malicious advertisements, is a growing issue on the world’s most popular search engines, including Bing, Google, and DuckDuckGo. Convincing ads for fake agencies, websites, banks, digital wallets, and government entities coax unwary users to click. This results in malware, viruses, commandeered browsers, stolen credentials, or ATO.

  • Scam e-Commerce Shops - 62% of surveyed consumers plan on doing their holiday shopping digitally. Apart from convenience, a primary attraction is the possibility of snagging hard-to-find, expensive, or out-of-stock products for a great deal. Resembling legitimate brands and websites, scam e-Commerce shops can part victims from their payment and personal information and then never ship the merchandise.

  • Counterfeit and Stolen Merchandise - Approximately 3.3% of all world trade is counterfeit, including electronics, apparel, cosmetics, and toys. Unlike the fake website scam discussed above, consumers actually receive their purchased item; it just happens to be counterfeit. Luxury products, including designer handbags and pro sports merchandise, are hot seasonal gift items and prime counterfeit candidates. For example, over $100 million worth of fake NFL merchandise was seized by federal agents prior to Super Bowl LVI. Stolen products also fall within this scam and are sold on popular online marketplaces by organized criminal networks that pilfer over $70 billion annually in products from brick-and-mortar shops.

  • Holiday Travel and Vacation Scams - Holiday travel and family vacation rentals are a lucrative business for fraudsters. In 2021, over 4,000 mentions of airline and hotel fraud were featured on the dark web, with travel and hospitality representing a booming underground market. Frequent flier mileage scams, currency exchange scams, fraudulent travel agencies, vacation rental cons, and loyalty program scams are becoming increasingly common. Fraudsters concoct elaborate techniques to create fake hotel or flight listings; flights and hotel packages can be bought with stolen card-not-present information or loyalty points before being resold at huge discounts. Payments are processed via illicit hosts and the bookings are then never redeemed.

  • Seasonal Job Scams - Seasonal workers are a holiday staple to help retailers and shipping companies meet demand surges. But honest job seekers are often scammed by fraudulent seasonal job offers that may increasingly involve remote work or originate on popular online employment websites. As synthetic identity fraud prospers, job seekers must be mindful of the synthetic media factor when acting on potential work-from-home roles, like envelope stuffing or re-shipping. Fraudsters might be using manufactured or edited audio, video, or still images to add authenticity to the job recruitment process.

  • Other Holiday Fraud Trends - Other worthy mentions in a disturbingly long catalog of holiday fraud trends include gift card scams, giveaway and sweepstakes scams, non-delivery notification scams, and gift exchange scams.

The holidays are just around the corner to usher in a bustling season of togetherness, shopping, travel, and charitable donations. It’s a special time of year for many of us – including fraudsters. However, being aware of the latest scams and fraud attacks can prevent you from becoming a victim.

The information provided is not intended to constitute legal advice and is intended for general informational purposes only.