Not upheld: scam - failure to prevent financial harm through intervention complaint against Revolut Ltd

Decision detail

Summary

Mrs D lost approximately £60,000 to a task-based job scam between March and July 2025, making 43 payments from her Revolut account to a cryptocurrency wallet in her own name. She had been making payments to the same scam from other accounts since November 2024 and was instructed by the scammer to misrepresent the payments as cryptocurrency investments or electrical purchases rather than job-related. Revolut intervened on multiple occasions and provided warnings about investment scams, but Mrs D did not reveal the true purpose of the payments. The ombudsman found that while Revolut should have intervened on the fourth payment of £3,000, any intervention would not have uncovered the scam because Mrs D had consistently followed the scammer's guidance to mislead account providers and was firmly under the scammer's influence by the time she used Revolut.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman acknowledged that while Revolut should have intervened on the fourth payment of £3,000 and did intervene on other occasions, any intervention would not have uncovered the scam. This is because Mrs D had been deliberately misrepresenting the purpose of payments following explicit guidance from the scammer. She had been making similar payments from other accounts since November 2024 and had consistently misled other account providers. The ombudsman found that Mrs D was 'firmly under the spell of the scammer' and would likely have continued to provide false information even if Revolut had intervened further. Revolut provided appropriate warnings for the stated purpose (cryptocurrency investment), but Mrs D did not reveal the true purpose (job scam). Therefore, Revolut did not miss an opportunity to prevent the scam.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website