As if the Australian Tax Office – plagued by the Plutus payroll and Michael and Adam Cranston saga – didn't have enough bad press at the moment. But the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) Deputy Chair Delia Rickard estimates around $2 million has been shelled out so far this year by unwitting victims to scammers claiming to be from the ATO.

"That's around 40,000 people," she said. "It's really huge – and that is only the people who are reporting the calls. Most people are too embarrassed to complain or do anything about it when they are conned.

"It's outrageous ... these people are operating from overseas call centres they have a script, they are threatening. They are big organised crime and they make a fortune," she said.

The ATO scam – where some one calls claiming to be from the ATO and that you owe them money – usually has a huge spike in calls from scammers at the end of the tax year. The Scamwatch website records there was a fourfold increase in the money lost in the ATO scam, known as upfront and advanced fee fraud, at the end of this financial year. The 2017 figures for June, show consumers lost nearly $1.4 million ($1,399,334) in fraud scams, which is almost four times the 2017 monthly average the scammers are bagging in cash. Last month (August) innocent tax payers were conned into giving $283,213 over to fraudsters – which has been around the usual 2017 monthly average.