A phone call–and Hazel’s accounts were emptied

HAZEL ANDREW, of Eastriggs, Dumfries & Galloway, got a phone call from the fraud department of her bank, saying they had noticed suspicious activity on two of her accounts.

The person on the phone, who claimed he was from Hazel’s bank, The Royal Bank of Scotland, said he would set up new accounts, so Hazel could transfer all the money in the accounts and safeguard it against the attempted fraud that was threatening her.

Hazel did as she was bid. It was close to bank closing time, late in the afternoon of Friday, May 20, last year. She transferred £8100 from a savings account and £3600 from her current account, using her card reader and PIN to make the transaction.

The caller said everything had gone smoothly and that Hazel would still be able to use her current debit card as the fraud department would arrange matters so the card accessed money in her new account.

That call wasn’t from RBS, it was from a low-life, common thief who played upon the honesty and trusting nature of a decent woman.

Hazel didn’t know she’d been scammed until the following Monday, when she attempted to make a transaction using her debit card in a shop and her card was declined.

She went straight home and rang the bank.

Her accounts were empty. No one from the bank had called her the previous Friday.

The caller hadn’t been from the bank, he was a criminal. He had set up accounts to have the money transferred into.

Hazel got in touch with the police.

She felt she had been robbed – the same as if someone had broken into her house and stolen cash, or a robber had held up the bank but had somehow only got his hands on her money.

The bank was able to claw back £5421.87 from the savings account, but nothing from the current account.

The thief had got away with £6278 of Hazel’s money.

Hazel has been an RBS customer for more than 40 years. She has never been overdrawn. She has never had a complaint about the service she has received, nor has RBS ever had cause to complain to her.

Her husband’s salary is paid in to the current account, her direct debits are paid on time. She is an exemplary customer.

Hazel contends that when RBS saw both her long-standing accounts being drained of cash at exactly the same time, questions should have been asked. Alarms should have rung.

Hazel said: “I feel totally let down by RBS. It refuses to take any responsibility for my losses. Perhaps it feels that it would be opening up the floodgates for other customers who have lost money in this way. Or that it will turn into another PPI scandal.

“My husband and I are from a generation who were railroaded into having our wages paid into the bank, we were given all sorts of promises about how secure our money would be. But we feel we have been let down.

“If my accounts were being monitored surely RBS should have telephoned and spoken to me personally to confirm that it was me who was using my PIN and my card reader, or even if there was any reason we were transferring our accounts to other banks (as it turned out to two different banks – one in the south of England and the other in Scotland).

I did not give my bank details to the scammer, he did not ask me for them. He asked me to use my card reader.

Hazel went to the finance ombudsman.

But the ombudsman said: “As we’re not the regulator of the banking industry, we are unable to look into or comment on banks internal procedure”.

Raw Deal asked RBS to explain itself.

An RBS spokesperson said: “We know how distressing falling victim to a scam can be and we do all we can to protect our customers from them and minimise the effects.

“Our first priority when a customer is a victim of a scam is to trace the money paid away and we’re pleased in this case we were able to recover a portion of the funds.

“Our customers’ actions are effectively the first line of defence against scams, so we regularly communicate with them to advise that we will never ask them for their secure details and the bank or the police will never phone them to instruct them to pay money away or use their card reader.

“We advise all of our customers to familiarise themselves with guidance on keeping safe from scams that we have available both online and in branches.”

Raw Deal suggested to RBS that Hazel’s money should be repaid to her. But they wouldn’t budge.

Hazel’s money is gone. Don’t let this happen to you.