Post Office Averted Fake Forwarding of Mail Sent to Florida’s Citizens

Florida’s Citizens Property Insurance is probably not missing any mail or checks from customers as the result of a fraudster’s attempt to divert its mail, although the insurer can’t be 100 percent certain.

Both Citizens and the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) confirmed that it’s unlikely any mail went missing after Insurance Journal and other media reported that as much as a week’s worth of mail could have been forwarded to a false address.

USPS informed Citizens on June 29 that someone had completed a fraudulent change of address form for Citizens. Another fraudulent form was also submitted over the Internet. But according to USPS, the mail forwarding never happened because by July 1 Citizens had responded to a USPS request for confirmation. Since Citizens did not confirm the address change, the mail forwarding request was immediately canceled and “there is no evidence … to suggest that any mail was forwarded,” according to the USPS.

According to Christine Ashburn, spokesperson for Citizens, the volume of mail at Citizens seemed normal. However, since the USPS has been unable to give a “100 percent guarantee” that no mail was fraudulently forwarded, Citizens is urging customers to verify that their checks were received and cashed by Citizens.