Fraudsters have stolen the identity of 15 education workers in the Fredericton area. The workers’ identity was stolen, resulting in false requests for employment insurance being made in their name. According to their union, the victims work as educational assistants and administrators in French schools in the capital region.
The Francophone Sud School District’s workers who had their identity stolen have been unable to access their benefits because their money was moved to other bank accounts instead. The workers said that someone gained access to their Service Canada accounts and moved their money.
Mélanie Gosselin, who works at École des Bâtisseurs in Fredericton, is one of those victims. She said:
“There were five or six demands that were made in my name. They changed my bank number and changed the language on my account. Mine is always in French, but they changed it to be served in English.”
Gosselin spent hours on the phone, talking with Service Canada who has been unable to resolve the situation yet.
“It’s always these endless wait times for them to tell you after an hour that ‘Yes, you’ve been scammed, I can’t do anything at my level, so I have to transfer you to our fraud department,'” Gosselin said.
Marie-Claude Lambert, who works at École Sainte-Anne, is also a victim of this fraud. She stated:
“After I realized that I wasn’t getting any payments in my account, I started asking questions. That’s when I realized that someone had changed the name of my mother, had changed my address and that they had all of my information in their possession. It’s stressful knowing all of my personal information is in someone else’s hands. It’s stressful to not know if I’m going to receive my benefits because someone else is getting them instead. Some nights I can’t sleep.”
Employment and Social Development Canada, a body responsible for resolving this problem, hasn’t sent a spokesperson to talk with the press yet.
