‘Bank’s crypto failure cost me £30,000’

his name to Ward in 1971 when his mother remarried. Mr Ward’s father was Bernard Dooley, who died in 2014 without leaving a will. He had remarried, outliving his second wife and leaving behind only one child – Mr Ward. As the father and son had been estranged for many years, the £27,000 estate was administered and divided up between other family members. The administrator instructed law firm JCP Solicitors to act on their behalf, but Mr Ward was never identified as the next of kin and sole beneficiary.

“It is not a huge amount, but it is my money and I have been denied my inheritance,” Mr Ward said. “I bear no ill feeling toward my cousin who administered the estate, as they probably didn’t even know I existed, but I wonder why the law firm didn’t carry out a check to find me.” Mr Ward discovered that his father had died and his inheritance had passed on to others after he attempted to learn more about him earlier this year.

Chris Shaw of JCP Solicitors said it was the responsibility of the administrator, not the law firm, to make sure assets were passed on correctly.

“It is our understanding that the administrator of the estate questioned by Mr Ward was entirely unaware of any other potential beneficiaries,” he said. “JCP’s legal team acted entirely correctly throughout this process.”

Hector Birchwood of Celtic Research, a genealogy firm, traced Mr Ward’s ancestry and confirmed his claim as legitimate. He added that the administrator would probably now be liable to repay the £27,000, even if they had not benefited from the estate.

“Solicitors act under the instructions of an administrator, so their liability ends there. This is when you get into the murky area of solicitors’ liability, which depends on the advice given and the level of knowledge possessed by the administrator,” he said.

Constance McDonnell of barristers’ chambers Serle Court said the nation’s apathy towards wills was “frightening”. She said: “It puts the administrator in a difficult position as they have a legal duty to find the closest next of kin and give them their money. They cannot resist this responsibility unless given permission by the courts.”

These days, she added, relatives may have moved abroad or cut all ties in a radical change of lifestyle. Some people do not want to be found.

Lenders say they protect customers from Bitcoin scams by blocking transactions but too many slip through the cracks, says ‘My cousin probably didn’t know I existed, but why didn’t the law firm carry out a check?’

using his MBNA credit card and the bank failed to block the transactions. He said he believed the trader who called him had managed to siphon away his money. He now faces trying to pay back his creditors.

“I am devastated and all but bankrupt. I have drawn down almost all the money I can from a lifetime mortgage plan,” he said. “This might result in me having to sell the house to pay off what I owe and move into rented accommodation, which I really don’t want to do.”

Lloyds said it tried to help customers retrieve money if they were disappointed with goods or services bought using its credit cards but was not liable to refund customers who invested in cryptocurrencies through trading platforms.

An MBNA spokesman said: “We sympathise with Mr Merriman’s situation but on this occasion we were unable to assist him and retrieve the money he lost.”

Richard Emery of 4Keys International, a fraud consultancy, said the banks had given themselves an impossible task.

“Can banks stop people from buying investments that are available from an ever-increasing number of providers? I would argue that they cannot. In fact, I would question whether the banks should even be policing this – it’s simply not enforceable,” he said.

He said Lloyds and Virgin Money were right to be concerned but that it was virtually impossible to keep up with the growth of the sector, especially as fraudsters tried to launch and close down sham websites faster than they could be identified by the authorities. Mr Emery also questioned the real motive for introducing the ban, which does not apply to debit cards. He suggested it could be because banks had a greater interest in protecting money lent to customers through credit cards than in protecting consumers’ own money held in their bank accounts.

“If they are that concerned about this issue, why is it that they are only banning it through credit cards? If they were serious about the ban they would implement it through all of their channels,” he added.

A spokesman for Virgin Money said: “We update our blocked merchant list on a continual basis to prevent cryptocurrency purchases and have robust controls in place to continuously monitor transactions and protect customers from fraud.”

AAA Trade told Mr Merriman the caller who persuaded him to invest had no connection with the company and that all its security checks designed to protect clients had been followed.

If someone does emerge with a claim to the estate further down the line, there are steps administrators can take to protect themselves.

Firstly, Miss McDonnell suggested publicising the death in a local or national paper. This is used mainly so that creditors can come forward, but also allows beneficiaries to make themselves known.

You can take out missing beneficiary insurance, but whether this is worth the expense will depend on the size of the estate.

Finally, Miss McDonnell said in some cases it was possible to get court approval to distribute an estate to someone if there was concern that there might be closer kin. Again, she said this option would be worth your while only if you had enough money in the estate to afford the legal cost. NS&I plans to short-change savers by shifting the measure of inflation on its Indexlinked Savings Certificates next May. This means half a million people, including many pensioners, will lose hundreds or even thousands of pounds in interest each year. Join our campaign to get NS&I to think again: sign our parliamentary petition at bit.ly/save_rpi