Is this message about a tax refund, rebate or grant genuine?

Government impersonation is second only to delivery scams by volume in the UK, and it rotates through whichever department is in the news — HMRC at self-assessment deadlines, DWP and energy bodies when support schemes are announced, DVLA when road tax is due, TV Licensing whenever a renewal wave goes out. The department changes; the shape does not.

Safety

Step by step

1. Start from GOV.UK, never from the message.GOV.UK publishes a page listing genuine HMRC contact methods, including which text messages and emails HMRC really does send and what they will never contain. Search for it directly rather than following any link you were sent.
2. Sign in to your own account to check.If HMRC genuinely owes you a repayment, it appears in your personal tax account and in the annual calculation letter. Sign in through GOV.UK yourself. Nothing in the message needs to be touched.
3. Apply the refund test.HMRC does not tell you about a refund by text or email with a link, and does not ask for your card or bank details in a message. Any message doing either is fake, whatever the sender name says.
4. Apply the threat test.HMRC does not ring to say a warrant has been issued, does not demand immediate payment to avoid arrest, and never asks for payment in gift cards, vouchers or cryptocurrency. Recorded-voice calls threatening arrest are entirely automated fraud.
5. Check any grant or rebate scheme against the department that runs it.Energy support, boiler grants, insulation schemes and cost-of-living payments are announced on GOV.UK and administered through named routes. Ofgem and government departments do not cold-call or text asking for bank details to pay you.
6. Report it to the right place.Forward suspicious HMRC texts to 60599 and suspicious HMRC emails to phishing@hmrc.gov.uk. Forward other scam texts to 7726 and other scam emails to report@phishing.gov.uk. Then delete.
7. If you have already given details, treat it as card fraud.Ring your bank on the number on your card or 159, freeze the card, and watch for the follow-up call pretending to be the bank's fraud team.

Tips

• HMRC does send some genuine texts and emails — for example about your tax code or to confirm a callback — but they never ask for personal or financial information and never carry a payment link. The GOV.UK list of genuine contacts is the way to tell.
• Automated "press 1 to speak to an officer" calls are always fraudulent. Pressing 1 connects you to a person whose job is to keep you on the line.
• A scam that names a real scheme is not evidence the message is real. Criminals read the same announcements you do, and volume spikes within days of any new support scheme.

Common mistakes

• Calling the number given in the message to "check" — It reaches the same operation and they are ready for the call. Get the number from GOV.UK yourself.
• Believing a caller because they know your name, address or partial National Insurance number — Those come from data breaches and public records and are used precisely to buy credibility in the first thirty seconds.

Questions people ask