First, it was fake bail bonds companies calling people saying a relative had been arrested, and they'd need to wire large chunks of money in order to get the defendant out of jail.

That later morphed into scammers posing as law enforcement officers, calling to tell whoever happened to pick up the phone that they had a warrant out for their arrest.  The fix, they'd say, was to simply wire transfer thousands of dollars and the problem would disappear.

But the Beverly Hills Police Department says the latest con artist ploy involves a woman with some sort of foreign accent who is posing as an IRS employee.

It all starts out simple enough, they said, with the caller pretending to be a bonafide government agent who is simply doing her job.  "You owe the IRS thousands in back taxes," she says, "and the only way to resolve this is to send us the money, right away, through WesternUnion."

Other times the caller will mix it up, and say the balance needs to be paid using prepaid debit cards.

All of these situations should serve as big red flags.

The IRS never asks people to pay using a wire transfer service and anyone who receives this type of call should contact local law enforcement as quickly as possible.

If you do think the call could be somewhat legit, take out a pen and piece of paper and start asking questions.  Find out the name of the person you're talking to, the office location they work out of and the name of their supervisor.

Ask about the tax year in question and why they didn't notify you by mail.  You can then follow up with the IRS on your own and make sure what you've been told is actually true.

Calls that end with "you need to wire us money right now" are a common ploy of con artists, according to Beverly Hills Police officials, and they're relying on scare tactics to get their hands on your hard earned cash.