SHOPS and businesses are being warned to be on the look-out for potential thieves using a bright yellow payment card to illegally purchase high value gift tokens.

The warning comes after a couple attempted to buy gift tokens from a newsagents on King Street in Stroud at around 2.45pm on Wednesday, April 2.

A man and a woman walked into the shop and attempted to buy a £100 B&Q gift token and a ‘Hello Kitty’ bag with a debit card.

The card was declined and while the man and the shop cashier were on the phone to the bank the woman appeared to produce a yellow bank card similar to a debit or credit card.

The cashier then told the two people that they would have to pay for the gift token with cash. The two chose not to buy the token, purchased the bag and left the shop.

The shop was alerted by the production of the yellow payment card as they had been told that other scams had been carried out across the country where a yellow card is used in a Chip and PIN machine. The machine accepts the card but no payment is made.

Senior harm reduction advisor Dave McFarlane said: “Although on this occasion no offence was committed, this incident has all the hallmarks of crimes committed previously where a fake payment card is used to pay for goods fraudulently.

“We would advise all local shops and businesses to be on their guard for people working in groups of two requesting to purchase high value gift tokens and using a yellow payment card to do so”

Anyone who may have any information on incidents of this nature is asked to contact Gloucestershire Police on 101, quoting incident number 282 of April 2.