SayNoToScams Practise delivery

text message · Delivery scam

Is the AusPost “redelivery fee” text a scam?

A scam — and the most reported one in Australia.

Below is the text message itself, with every phrase that gives it away marked and numbered. There are 4 signs to find. It is invented for practice — the pattern comes from the public alert linked at the bottom.

From
+61 466 019 3371
Received
Today 8:52 am

AusPost: Your parcel AU8842193 is being held at our facility. A $2.45 redelivery fee is outstanding2. Confirm here to release:auspost-redeliver.co/au88423

Failure to pay within 24 hours will return your item to sender.4

Why it is a scam

  1. The sender is a personal mobileAustralia Post texts come from a named service, never someone’s mobile. Anyone can buy a SIM for $2 and send from it.
  2. A fee for a delivery you already paid forAusPost does not collect redelivery fees by text link. The $2.45 isn’t the point — getting your card into their form is.
  3. The address is not auspost.com.auRead a web address backwards from the last dot: this one is auspost-redeliver.co. Everything in front is decoration anyone can choose.
  4. A 24-hour deadlineThe clock is there so you tap now instead of opening the app and checking whether a parcel exists at all.

What to do

Don’t tap it. Open the official AusPost app, or type auspost.com.au yourself, and look up the tracking number. If there’s no parcel, there was never a parcel.

Pattern drawn from Australia Post scam alerts

Practise

Reading it is not the same as catching it

You have just been told the answer. The drill shows this message without it, one at a time, and asks you to call it.

Start the delivery set

If it has already happened

Not your fault, and not too late

Ring your bank, report it, and tell one person you trust. The first hour matters most.

What to do now