Not upheld: Fraud reimbursement (APP scams) complaint against ICICI Bank UK Plc

Decision detail

Summary

Mr S complained that ICICI Bank UK Plc should refund approximately £8,732.75 he lost to a recovery scam involving cryptocurrency payments made via his debit card. The scammers claimed they could recover funds from a previous scam but instead defrauded Mr S by instructing him to purchase cryptocurrency. The ombudsman found that while Mr S was clearly victimized, ICICI had no obligation to refund because the payments were authorized by Mr S, the complaint was made outside the chargeback time window, the payments went to a cryptocurrency exchange rather than directly to scammers, and the individual transaction amounts were not unusually high. The complaint was not upheld.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman found that while Mr S was clearly a victim of a scam, this does not automatically mean the bank must refund the loss. The payments were authorized by Mr S (albeit under scammer instruction), made outside the chargeback time window, and directed to a cryptocurrency exchange rather than directly to the scammers. The individual payment amounts were not sufficiently high to trigger reasonable intervention by the bank. Therefore, ICICI had no reasonable recovery options and no duty to intervene at the time of the transactions.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website