(KIWA Staff Photo)
Statewide Iowa (RI) — Iowa’s largest utility — and the one serving Sheldon and several other Northwest Iowa towns — is warning its customers to be wary if they’re using a search engine to find the company’s 800-number for customer service. MidAmerican Energy spokesman Dan Winters says scammers are using paid search engine ads to manipulate search results and steer people to fake phone numbers — with crooks waiting to take your call.
To pay a utility bill online, customers should go through the MidAmerican website, and Winters says, if they’re hunting for the address or phone number using a search engine, to review the results carefully before clicking.
The bogus numbers are changing frequently, and, were you to call one, the person who answers will be posing as a MidAmerican staffer.
If you think you’re being scammed or threatened, just hang up. He says MidAmerican never demands immediate payment through gift cards, cryptocurrency or other unconventional payment methods. Based in Des Moines, MidAmerican Energy serves 1.3 million electric and natural gas customers in Iowa. Click here for more information from MidAmerican.
In our area, MidAmerican provides both gas and electric service in Sheldon, Archer, Germantown, Calumet, Sutherland, Granville, Newkirk, Hospers, Boyden, Hull, Rock Valley, Doon, Alvord, and Inwood. They also provide electric service only in a number of smaller communities in our area.
