Small Businesses Warned of Fraudsters Seeking COVID Relief Fees

Small, medium and macro enterprises in South Africa should watch out for fraudulent agencies purporting to be entities of the Department of Small Business Development and trying to extract fees out of them.

“It has come to the attention of the department that an unknown company is requesting food producers and agro-processors to send through proposal to an e-mail address not known by the department, Small Enterprise Finance Agency SOC Ltd (SEFA) or Small Enterprise Development Agency (Seda),” the department said on Monday.

The DSBD said it is aware of suspicious email messages attempting to take advantage of the COVID-19 relief funding for SMMEs by soliciting administration fees to fast-track applications.

“Cyber criminals use emergencies such as the National Disaster to steal money from victims, perform identity theft or pretend to be representatives of the department and its agencies using fake emails to scam unsuspecting recipients,” the department said.

The public should note that the department will not be launching any live market access session on Facebook.

“No employee of the department is paid either through emails, inboxes, direct messages (DM) for services rendered on behalf of the department. The facilitation to access services for SMMEs is done for free,” the department said.

Any SMME who receives such a request must immediately report the incident to the COVID-19 Hotline 086 677 7867 or send an e-mail to info@dsbd.gov.za.

SMMEs are encouraged to register their businesses on www.smmesa.gov.za.

– SAnews.gov.za