Not upheld: Fraud reimbursement (APP scams) complaint against Bank of Scotland plc

Decision detail

Summary

Mr P lost £5,900 to an investment fraud scheme after transferring funds from his Bank of Scotland account to a money remittance provider account in his own name. He claimed BoS should reimburse him for the fraud loss. The ombudsman found the complaint not upheld because the payment was authorised by Mr P to an account in his own name, and BoS was not unreasonable in processing it without intervention given the newly opened account and confirmation of payee match. Even if BoS had intervened, the evidence suggested Mr P would not have been honest about the payment purpose or responsive to warnings given his trust in the fraudster.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

While BoS should reasonably look out for transactions indicating fraud risk and intervene where appropriate, the circumstances here did not make intervention unreasonable. The newly opened account provided no transaction history to identify suspicious patterns, and the confirmation of payee match lowered the risk profile. Even if BoS had intervened, Mr P was unlikely to have been honest about the payment purpose and would likely have disregarded warnings based on his trust in the fraudster and distrust of payment service providers. Therefore, BoS could not have prevented the loss.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website