2 Arrested For Defrauding Airtel Customers

Two men who posed as Airtel agents and salesmen to dupe many customers of various amounts of money under the pretext of registering them for Airtel Mobile Money have been nabbed by the Brong Ahafo Police.

The two guys, whose names were not released by the police due to ongoing investigations, were arrested by Airtel officials at Sunyani Maize Market yesterday.

They were in the process of duping other unsuspecting customers.

In an interview with Daily Guide, the Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the Ghana Police Service in the Brong Ahafo Region, Chief Inspector Augustine Kinsley Oppong, said the suspects asked customers to deposit monies into mobile wallet accounts in order to register for Airtel Mobile Money.

“They took money ranging from GHC5 to GHC300 from the customers and succeeded in duping seven customers who lodged complaints with the company. The men have since been kept by the regional police headquarters for further investigations. The guys told the police they were from Airtel headquarters in Accra and referred to themselves as Airtel Mobile Money Freelancers, according Police PRO.

“Our preliminary investigations showed that they had been in Sunyani for the past four days and succeeded in duping unsuspecting customers.

Throwing more light on the arrest, the Airtel Territory Manager, Stephen Sackey, said customers reported that some guys from the company had registered them for mobile money wallet and asked them to deposit monies into their accounts, promising the monies would be doubled in a month’s time with interest.

The customers said they realized the SIM cards had not even been registered and suspected foul play.

He explained that registering mobile money account does not attract cost and asked customers to be vigilant.

According to Stephen Sackey, some of the company’s security men were deployed to monitor them and subsequently arrested the two guys at the Sunyani Maize Market and handed them over to the police for further investigations.

He said the suspects were arrested in Accra sometime ago, but jumped bail in Accra, Takoradi and Kumasi.

The police, however, did not give out their names since investigations were still ongoing to identify their true identities.