Not upheld: fraud prevention - unnecessary account block complaint against National Westminster Bank Public Limited Company (NatWest)

Decision detail

Summary

Mr F and Miss M complained that NatWest unnecessarily blocked Mr F's debit card on 23 December when a transaction was flagged as suspicious, despite the transaction having left the account regularly for nine years. They also complained that NatWest contacted Mr F using a number flagged as spam by his network provider. The ombudsman found that NatWest acted fairly and reasonably in applying the fraud block as part of its duty to protect customer accounts, made multiple attempts to contact Mr F, and cannot be held responsible for the network provider's error in flagging its number as spam. The complaint was not upheld.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman accepted that NatWest has a duty of care to protect customer accounts and acted within its Terms and Conditions by placing the fraud block. The ombudsman found that NatWest made reasonable attempts to contact Mr F at the earliest opportunity and that it cannot be held responsible for a third-party network provider's decision to flag its telephone number as spam. The ombudsman also found that Mr F had the ability to access his account details through electronic banking to complete verification checks.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website