£50,000 recovered for a “safe account” victim who thought they were speaking to their bank

Our client was the victim of a ‘safe account’ scam. They were contacted by scammers who impersonated their bank. They claimed that our client’s account was at risk and that they needed to move the money to a “safe account” to protect it.

The scammers attempted previous transactions on our client’s account, which appeared as being declined on their mobile banking app. They claimed that this was scammers accessing their account and that they needed to move it quickly to avoid losing all their money.

What made this particularly convincing was that the scammers were able to spoof the bank's official number and send an SMS message to our client’s phone, which made them believe they were speaking to the bank.

The “safe account” was not safe at all

Our client, believing they were transferring their money to their own account, transferred the money to the said “safe account”. Unfortunately, this account was actually controlled by the scammers, and once the funds were sent, they were lost.

The client was in a state of despair and came to us, not knowing what steps to take. We provided a thorough investigation and helped the client through the process of recovering their funds.

We helped our client gather all the evidence they needed and provided a bespoke report to the bank, showing why our client should be reimbursed.

The bank initially rejected the complaint, which we then escalated to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS). The FOS agreed that the bank was at fault, and our client was reimbursed the full £50,000 they lost.