'Tis the season for holiday scams. Here's how to avoid them

If you're spending more this holiday season, you may miss extra charges on your credit card that you didn't actually make.

Police say it's fairly common year-round, but happens more often this time of year.

Irene Ahner has experienced it first-hand.

Despite living on a farm in southwest Saskatchewan, she was recently charged for several SkipTheDishes food orders in Winnipeg.

"I called the company that I deal with, Mastercard, and they went, 'Oh yeah, we've had a lot of those complaints lately.' They said they would take that [charge] off my card and I would be credited for those erroneous purchases," Ahner said in an interview on The Morning Edition Thursday.

Ahner saidshe was told thatscammers will go through random credit card numbers until one works.

Sgt. Kelley Berting, who works in the Regina Police Service's financial crimes unit, said what happened to Ahner could happen to anyone who makes purchases online.

"If you think about all of the places where you may use your credit card and whether those internet sites are not as safe or secure as we believe they are, there's always a risk for any information that's shared online," she said.

Avoid unsecured public Wi-Fi

Berting saidit's important to double check your credit card statements, especially over the holiday season.

She also recommended people avoiding public Wi-Fi that's not secure.

"If you're out shopping or going to different places and your phone is automatically linking into public Wi-Fi, it's not password protected and there's a huge risk there for your information to be accessed through those Wi-Fi sites," she said.

When shopping online using a cellphone, Berting suggested looking for a lock symbol in the URL, which confirms that the network is secure.

She also recommended looking over websites for signs they may be a spoof. That means watching for things such as spelling mistakes or anything else that could look out of the ordinary.

Double-check gift card barcodes

Berting warned of gift card scams as well. Specifically, fraudstersmay go into stores where gift cards are sold and replace barcodes with another that loads money onto their own cards.

"If you're buying a gift card at Christmas, it's always a really good idea to make sure you check the gift card over feel the back of it and make sure that nothing has been added to it. If it's in a paper package, make sure it hasn't been tampered with," Berting advised.

"Now is the time to be extra vigilant with all those types of scams."