Fri, May 13th 2022 12:15 pm

By the Better Business Bureau 

Shortages in the supply of baby formula are leading new moms to find other ways to get the much-needed item – and risking themselves to potential online scams. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced it is taking proactive measures to increase supply to help ease the shortage. 

According to the 2021 BBB Scam Tracker Risk Report, online shopping scams are the riskiest. Scammers are watching the current supply issues on many items, including formula. 

How It Works

An ad, post or social media group posts they have baby formula available. The buyer contacts the seller via chat or direct message, showing photos of the cans available. The buyer makes a payment through a peer-to-peer platform such as PayPal (a BBB Accredited Business) or Venmo (a BBB Accredited Business), but the formula never arrives.

Signs of a potential online purchase scam include: 

√ Positive reviews that were copied from legitimate sites or created by scammers. Some review websites claim to be independent but are paid for by scammers. Check BBB.org.

√ There is no indication of a brick-and-mortar address, or the address shows on a Google map as a parking lot, residence, or unrelated business.

√ Misspellings, grammatical errors, or other descriptive languages that are not consistent with the product.

√ The seller advertises on a social media site and is communicative until the payment clears. Once that happens, they…