Not upheld: unauthorized transactions / fraud claim complaint against Nationwide Building Society

Decision detail

Summary

Mr S complained that Nationwide declined to reimburse unauthorized transactions debited from his account, claiming his computer had been infected with a virus and that one payment occurred abroad while he was in the UK. Nationwide's fraud team and the FOS investigator both concluded the payments were likely authorized by Mr S. The ombudsman analyzed technical evidence showing all transactions occurred on Mr S's own mobile device using his biometric verification, with no evidence of unauthorized access or device compromise. The ombudsman found that the pattern of transferring funds to Mr S's own account before gambling expenditure, combined with evidence that Mr S had actually used gambling sites, indicated he authorized the transactions. The complaint was not upheld, and Nationwide was required to do nothing further.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman applied the Payment Services Regulations 2017, which require determining whether transactions were properly authenticated and whether Mr S consented to them. The technical evidence demonstrated that all transactions occurred on Mr S's own device using his biometric verification, with no evidence of compromise or unauthorized access. The pattern of moving funds to his own account before gambling expenditure, combined with evidence that Mr S had actually used gambling sites, suggested Mr S authorized the transactions. The malware on his computer could not have transferred to his iPhone due to operating system incompatibility and Apple's code signature requirements. The ombudsman concluded that even if Nationwide should have intervened based on unusual spending patterns, no loss occurred because Mr S authorized the transactions.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website