Santa Cruz company losing business because of scammers

Bonnie Ford and her husband started Affordable Heating and Air more than 20 years ago and said these supposed scammers are ruining her livelihood.

“People have been cold called by a company around town saying they are working with Affordable Heating.”

Ford says the people posing as Affordable Heating call potential costumers with a deal on a whole house air duct cleaning for $49, but when the alleged workers show up they charge thousands of dollars.

“The problem is I often get irate people calling in here going ‘What’s going on? This company said they were working with you.’ And I have to then advise them that it’s a scam, they are not indeed working with us they are just using our name.”

Affordable Heating says look out for red flags like when people come door-to-door selling their services. The company says always as for a contractors license number, look for misspelled words on their documents and do research on the name to make sure it’s a real company.

The Fords noticed the calls from customers about the scam started just before the holidays and say they are starting to pick up again.

The Santa Cruz County Consumer Affairs Agency said its received around 50 calls from people saying they almost fell for the fake business proposal, two of those actually wrote checks to the scammers then later stopped payment.

“The first thing I would advise people to do really is not accept cold calls from people trying to sell you something…It’s a little bit dangerous you don’t know who is coming to your house,” said Robin Gaysin.

If you receive a call from someone you believe you were contacted by a scam call Consumer Affairs at (831) 454-2050.