“Con Ed will shut off your power in 30 minutes” — the utility scam call, explained

The call comes in on a busy afternoon: “This is Con Edison. Your account is past due and a crew is on the way to disconnect your service in 30 minutes. To stop it, you need to pay now.” It's a scam, and it hits restaurants, small shops, and older New Yorkers hardest — because a shutoff would be a disaster for all of them.

The rules that expose it

Con Edison says plainly that it does not accept gift cards, cryptocurrency, Venmo, Zelle, or PayPal, and that its emails come from addresses ending in coned.com (Con Edison, Nov 2025). PSEG Long Island — which also serves the Rockaways — runs the same warning every year: Slow down. Verify. Stop the scam. (PSEG LI)

So any of these means it's fake:

They want payment by gift card, Zelle, Venmo, Cash App, PayPal, crypto, or a Bitcoin ATM.
They demand payment within minutes.
They tell you not to hang up, or to stay on the line while you go buy cards.
The caller ID says “Con Edison” — caller ID is easy to fake.

What to do instead

Hang up. You won't lose your power by ending the call.
Call the number on your actual bill: Con Edison at 1-800-75-CONED, PSEG Long Island at 1-800-490-0025.
Ask them whether your account has a balance. It almost never does.

Protecting parents and grandparents

These scams work because they're urgent and they're scary. A few things make a huge difference:

A family code word. Agree on a word that anyone asking for urgent money has to know. Scammers won't.
Call filtering. Both iPhone (Silence Unknown Callers) and Android (Call Screen on many phones) can send unknown numbers to voicemail. Your carrier also offers free scam-blocking apps.
Payment limits. Ask the bank about lowering daily Zelle limits and getting alerts on every transaction.
A sticky note by the phone: “Con Ed never asks for gift cards. Hang up and call 1-800-75-CONED.”

For business owners

Train whoever answers the phone: no payments over the phone to anyone claiming to be a utility, the city, or a vendor “changing bank details.” Verify by calling the number you already have on file — never the number the caller gives you.

When to call a tech

We set up scam-proof phones and accounts for parents all the time: call filtering, MFA on email and banking, transaction alerts, and a quick walkthrough so they know the signs. It's one short visit or a remote session, and it pays for itself the first time it blocks a call.