Not upheld: Fraud reimbursement (APP scams) complaint against Barclays Bank UK PLC trading as Barclaycard

Decision detail

Summary

Mr S complained that Barclaycard failed to refund £3,000 in transactions made by his family member R after Mr S provided his card under alleged coercion and physical intimidation. Mr S claimed he was a vulnerable student who had not benefited from the transactions and that R had promised repayment. Barclaycard declined the refund, treating it as a civil matter and applying Section 84 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974, which permits liability where a card is used by someone with the debtor's consent. The ombudsman upheld Barclaycard's position, finding that despite Mr S's claims of coercion, he had consented to R's use of the card, continued to use the available credit himself, and delayed reporting the matter for eight months after R disappeared, contradicting his assertion of ongoing duress.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman applied Section 84 of the Consumer Credit Act 1974, which states that a debtor can be held liable for use of a credit card by someone who acquired it with the debtor's consent. Although Mr S claimed coercion, the ombudsman found that coercion does not generally invalidate consent in financial transactions where the agreed form and function are followed. The evidence showed Mr S provided the card to R, R made payments against the balance, and Mr S continued to use the available credit created by those payments. The ombudsman found Mr S was not entirely passive in the arrangement and that his version of events was contradicted by the account records. The timing of the report (September 2025, eight months after R disappeared in January 2025) undermined Mr S's claim that he could not report the matter due to ongoing familial duress. The ombudsman concluded that Barclaycard acted fairly in holding Mr S liable because he had consented to R's use of the card.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website