This time last year I had a life-changing amount of money stolen.
There was no obvious scam. I hadn’t sent any payments. It was just gone.
The police weren’t helpful and the bank did nothing but gaslight me the entire time.
Today the Financial Ombudsman found the bank at fault and have ordered everything to be paid back + compensation.
I cannot begin to express the relief I’m feeling after such an awful year.
Lots of happy crying this morning 🥲
@phill phew! glad to hear it's all ended well! just a horrible thing to deal with up until this point
@phill wait. nobody had an idea how money could be booked directly off of your bank account?
@phill any tips people should take away and learn from?
@rwitherspoon frustratingly they won’t tell me the full details, so it’s hard to say what I or anyone could do differently.
But these things ultimately worked in my favour:
- getting a crime number asap
- noting everything the bank says down
- assuming bank is out to screw me
@phill @rwitherspoon good tips, but to be honest I read things like this and it reminds me of a more basic thing. I should probably check my transactions every now and then! Presumably that's how you noticed. I worry that someone could empty my bank account down to the last thousand quid (enough to avoid bills bouncing) and I don't know when I would even notice...
but apparently I don't worry enough to do anything about it.
@harry_wood @rwitherspoon definitely having some sort of routine to check your accounts is a good idea.
In my particular instance I checked fairly regularly, but rather sinisterly banking alerts weren’t being sent to me (despite receiving marketing alerts, which is what prompted me to check that day). Assume alerts won’t help you either.
@phill @harry_wood @rwitherspoon it’s a bit annoying especially if you are anti-notifications, but having them sent after every transaction is prolly the fastest way to catch something immediately.
@bardi Can you do that? I've often thought "Why doesn't my bank just notify me of *every* transaction?"
@phill @rwitherspoon aargh I'm already freaking out because my Portuguese bank changed their records re:
- passport #
- DOB, and
- issued a new card without letting me know (thus breaking most of my online payments in the scariest way possible).
Like, how are they supposed to detect fraud if they keep messing this up :)
The amount of gaslighting and bizarre excuses was like watching an absurdist Czech movie. It's so deep I can't even put it into words any more.
@phill sounds awful 😫. You should name and shame the bank for forcing you to go to the ombudsman to get your money back.
@phill holy shit! Congratulations! I’m sorry that must have been such a terrible time 😓
@phill Nice! It’s great to hear a happy ending to this story.
@phill congratulations!
@phill This sounds utterly terrifying. Hoping they’ll release the decision analysis at https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/decisions-case-studies/ombudsman-decisions
@phill oh my gosh I’m glad for you man.
@phill Glad you'll get that money back
@phill oh I remember this BS. I love a surprise happy ending.
@phill Glad to hear that!
The whole thing made me paranoid; how could I have been compromised in such a catastrophic way?
Turns out (perhaps unsurprisingly) the weakest link in the chain was human. A fake ID was used inside a branch to gain access to my accounts. Additional checks that were supposed to be carried out, weren’t.
The bank issued the fraudsters with a new card and PIN number. And that was it. They had everything they needed.