Scammers blocking banks’ phone lines with sob stories

Fraudsters may be clogging up banks’ phone lines and preventing legitimate customers from getting through, Telegraph Money has learned.

Start-up bank Monzo said its phone lines are regularly inundated with calls from suspected scammers complaining that their accounts have been frozen. The bank will shut down accounts it suspects of being fraudulent but, not wishing to tip off a potential criminal, will not inform its owner why.

Oblivious criminals often then ring up to complain, with elaborate sob stories reportedly involving audio recordings of babies crying and desperate pleas of needing the account unfrozen.

Customer service lines are under ever-greater pressure thanks to bank branch closures and high-profile data breaches.

James Daley, of campaign group Fairer Finance, said many consumers were unhappy with telephone banking. He added: “People regularly complain that it takes ages to speak to someone and, even then, they find themselves transferred from person to person.”

The past year has seen a constant stream of customer service crises within banking.

In July, customers of Sainsbury’s Bank were left waiting for more than two hours, with many having to ring back repeatedly for four days before being put through.

Similarly, TSB has been repeatedly criticised this year after those who were targeted by fraudsters following a massive data breach in April were left on hold for 90 minutes or more.

Banks and building societies are closing branches at a rate of around 60 a month, according to consumer watchdog Which?, but consumers complain that these closures have not been coupled with improvements to telephone services.

Following its torrid summer, TSB said it recruited 1,800 additional staff to deal with phone calls. It said it was not aware of any issues specific to fraudsters calling its customer service lines.

Sainsbury’s Bank said its customer service line problems were due to a specific issue which has now been resolved.