Royal Mail scam text: How to spot them and what to do if you get one

The Royal Mail scam text is being sent to an increasing number of us.

Updated on1st February 2022 at 1.14pm

Your phone pings and it's a message from what appears to be the Royal Mail, attempting to rearrange a parcel delivery. You are expecting some parcels to be delivered, so this all seems fairly legitimate, right?

Before you click on the link you should stop and think - could this be a scam? In recent months, there has been a huge increase in the number of people receiving these Royal Mail scam texts, and these scammers are out to charge you for the redelivery of the non-existent item in question.

To keep your on the alert and safe from these scams, we've put together a guide of the kinds of messages you need to be aware of and how to report them.

What do the Royal Mail scam texts look like?

There are a number of different text examples that the Royal Mail are sharing to help people be wary of these kinds of messages. We've rounded up some of the most common scam texts below.

Royal Mail scam text examples

1 of 6

Claiming that your package has been found

2 of 6

Shipping fee costs

3 of 6

A link that takes you to a fake Royal Mail website

4 of 6

Text with bitly link

5 of 6

Mention of 'XMAS-list'

6 of 6

Cost for redelivery

How to avoid being scammed

• Don't click on any links - if you're suspicious at all in any way, do not click on the links in the text message and ignore the message.

• Never share your information

• If you're worried, contact the Royal Mail

How to report scam texts

You can report any scam messages to 7726. This is a free reporting service provided by phone operators. This information is then shared with police and intelligence agencies to hopefully put a stop to this happening again.

What does The Royal Mail say?

In response to the scams, The Royal Mail have released the following statement to help the public understand what to look out for on legitimate messages from them:

‘We remind our customers that Royal Mail will only send email and SMS notifications in cases where the sender has requested this when using our trackable products that offer this service. In cases where customers need to pay a surcharge for an underpaid item, we would let them know by leaving a grey Fee To Pay card.

‘We would not request payment by email or text. The only time we would ask customers to make a payment by email or by text is in some instances where a customs fee is due. In such cases, we would also leave a grey card telling customers that there’s a Fee to Pay before we can release the item.'