Durham couple's mail delivery hijacked by scammers

A Durham couple reached out to WRAL's 5 On Your Side after someone hijacked their mail delivery. They said it took more than two months for the USPS to fix it.

Posted 12:42 a.m. Feb 9, 2022 — Updated 12:42 a.m. Feb 9, 2022

Monica Laliberte

, WRAL 5 On Your Side reporter/executive producer

DURHAM, N.C. — A Durham couple reached out to WRAL's 5 On Your Side after someone hijacked their mail delivery.

The first sign, that the couple initially missed came in November, when the amount of mail they were getting in their box dwindled.

Expected credit card statements, household bills and gifts for a new granddaughter never arrived.

The only mail they did receive were notices that they changed their address.

"I said no way, change it back. It's fraud," said Arnold Dunn. "I didn't think that there was some sort of terrible thing going on, yet."

Michelle and Arnold Dunn figured out that a scammer had filed a change of address form to the United States Postal Service to have all items redirected to an address in New Jersey.

WRAL's 5 On Your Side found it's pretty easy to get an address changed, whether online or in person, with a form from the post office. But, what the Dunn's found, getting the USPS to fix the fraud and change the address back is not easy.

After two months, the postal service finally stopped forwarding the Dunn's mail to New Jersey.

"The scope of this, you know, can get bigger and bigger," Michelle Dunn said. "And I don't think It's over."

The couple set up fraud alerts, changed all their account information and took recommended steps we can all do to help keep it from happening in the first place.

Officials recommend going paperless and signing up for informed delivery, which is a free program through the post office that sends you daily pictures of mail being delivered.

"If you get any correspondence that talks about a change of address, you better take it serious," Arnold Dunn said.

The good news for the Dunns — none of their accounts were compromised.

The USPS said they send a letter verifying an address change, and that one was sent to the Dunns, but the couple said they never received one.

The couple is concerned about how long it was taking to get the serious problem corrected and wants to warn others.

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