Not upheld: unauthorized transactions / disputed payments complaint against Barclays Bank UK PLC

Decision detail

Summary

Mr N complained that Barclays refused to refund two unauthorized payments totaling £2,500 from his savings account made on 1 and 3 December 2025. Barclays investigated and found no evidence of fraud, noting that the payments were made using Mr N's genuine registered device, his passcode, and from IP addresses consistent with his previous legitimate transactions. The ombudsman upheld Barclays' decision, finding that the technical evidence, security protections on the phone (Touch ID), the mathematical improbability of guessing the passcode, and the pattern of transactions all indicated that Mr N himself, rather than a third party fraudster, had authorized the payments. The complaint was not upheld and no refund was ordered.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman applied the Payment Services Regulations 2017, which place liability on the bank if the customer did not authorize payments, and on the customer if they did. The technical evidence conclusively showed that Mr N's genuine device, registered phone, and passcode were used to make the payments. The ombudsman found it implausible that a third party fraudster could have accessed the phone without Mr N's knowledge given its Touch ID protection, the 100,000 possible combinations of a five-digit passcode making guessing impossible, and the pattern of transactions showing undisputed activity interspersed with the disputed payments. The consistent IP address usage and the improbability of a fraudster returning the phone to Mr N between transactions further supported that Mr N himself made the payments.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website