Not upheld: Fraud reimbursement (APP scams) complaint against WorldRemit Ltd

Decision detail

Summary

Miss V lost £3,620 through an authorised push payment (APP) scam after being contacted on a professional networking platform and offered a job opportunity requiring international payments. She made five payments via SendWave between 27-28 May 2025, of which SendWave recovered and refunded only the first (£236), leaving her claiming £3,384 in losses. The ombudsman found SendWave not liable, determining that the payments were not unusual or remarkable given SendWave's core purpose of international money transfers, there was no historic account activity to suggest suspicious behaviour, and the remaining funds had already been withdrawn by recipients, making recovery impossible. The ombudsman acknowledged Miss V was a victim of a sophisticated scam but found SendWave had no involvement in the scam and acted reasonably in its recovery attempts.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman applied the starting position that payment service providers must process authorised payments in accordance with terms and conditions, making the customer responsible under PSR 2017. However, firms have obligations to protect customers from fraud and scams. The ombudsman found SendWave had no reasonable basis to intervene: the payments were not unusual given SendWave's core purpose of international money transfers, there was no historic account activity to suggest out-of-character behaviour, the payment amounts were not remarkable, and three payments on one day were not made in rapid succession. The destination country was a common SendWave transfer location. Regarding recovery, SendWave acted reasonably by contacting all recipient providers and successfully recovering one payment; the others had already been withdrawn. International payment recovery is inherently more difficult than domestic recovery due to different industry standards, legal frameworks, and lack of UK regulatory binding on international providers.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website