A number of visitors for the TT have been scammed out of as much as £850 with fake accommodation.
Police have said that four visitors in total have fallen victim to the scam.
These four reports have been made to the police during the TT fortnight, so there are now investigations into two people obtaining money by deception and two people committing fraud.
The two fraud investigations occurred within a couple of weeks leading up to TT when visitors made last minute bookings for accommodation before travelling to the island.
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Meanwhile, the other two occurred in 2019 and 2021 respectively.
The bookings were rolled over from previous years when the TT was cancelled for two years running due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
These were however only reported in the last few weeks.
Various online forms have been used in these offences by the fraudsters.
These include AirBnB and IOM Homestay pages on Facebook.
In other cases it is unclear what forum has been used.
Sergeant Andy Reed explained that people are always looking to scam people off the back of the island-wide event.
He said: ‘Most people are losing somewhere in the region of £750 to £850 deposits upfront.
‘They’re either turning up to find the property is being lived in by the actual owners or the property doesn’t exist and the property is no longer on AirBnB where it was originally listed, so as a result they have nowhere to stay.
‘The scammers will have used a fake AirBnB account.
‘People have got to be wary of Facebook groups when booking things like accommodation.’
He stressed the importance of doing research before booking for next year.
Sergeant Reed added that it was likely the people behind the scam were not from the Isle of Man and had taken photos from online to use in advertising the bogus accommodation.
He advised that anyone who is affected should report it straight to the police.
The TT Homestay scheme is operated by Isle of Man-based firm MiQuando and all visitors were encouraged to apply for Homestay through its official website at homestay.miquando.com.
From there, they could complete an online form to be placed somewhere on the island for their stay.
This year, as of May 25, 756 properties were registered with MiQuando to offer accommodation across the TT and Manx Grand Prix 2022 events, with an average of eight to 10 nights.