Not upheld: scam loss recovery - investment fraud complaint against National Westminster Bank Public Limited Company (NatWest)

Decision detail

Summary

Mrs E lost approximately £4,000 to a recruitment scam between summer 2025 and early 2026. She made card payments from her NatWest account to regulated cryptocurrency exchanges, purchased cryptocurrency, and sent it to scammers who posed as recruiters. After discovering the scam in early 2026, she reported it to NatWest and requested reimbursement. The ombudsman found that NatWest was not liable because Mrs E authorised the payments, the individual amounts were not unusually large or rapid, payments were spread over six months to regulated firms in her own name, and post-scam recovery was not possible. The complaint was not upheld.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

Although Mrs E authorised the payments, she did not intend for the money to reach scammers. Under Payment Services Regulations, Mrs E is liable for authorised payments in the first instance. Banks must balance fraud prevention with minimal disruption to legitimate payments. The individual payments were not remarkably large or rapid, were spread over six months, went to regulated firms in Mrs E's own name, and did not follow a suspect pattern. Therefore, NatWest was not required to intervene. Post-scam, recovery was not possible as funds had been converted to cryptocurrency and sent to scammers, and chargebacks would have been against the legitimate crypto exchanges rather than the scammers.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website