Working in banking, I have a vested interest in this type of story.
A while ago I posted about a director of client wanting to pay £100k by transfer to buy a car to an account with another bank that had fraud markers on it and the other bank hand not closed the account. We told him in no uncertain terms that we believed the transaction was to a fraudster.
We refused the transfer.
We threatened to close his accounts and went to another bank to make the transfer. He lost his money and is now claiming from that bank who are asking the fraudsters bank for the payee details under a Norwich Pharmacal order.
His other bank is also asking for disclosure from us (recordings telling him it's all a scam etc.).
The problem is that the banks are not really responsible but are an easy target for the Govt who don't want to spend money tracking the thieves down so get the ombudsman to create a rules framework that compels them to pay out in most cases.
Imagine having goods in one of those yellow box storage centres. You send them a note to that a Joe Bloggs is going to collect the goods because he says he needs some new furniture urgently because his house got flooded and he will pay you after collecting the goods.
Joe Bloggs turns up and takes the goods and disappears for good.
Now imagine the response from yellow box storage company if you went back to them and demanded they replaced your goods!
I think they would refer you to the reply given in the case of Arkell v. Pressdram.
And I think the banks should do the same in many such obvious cases.
I do wonder if some of these stories are set ups. I.e. fraudster and victim get together to transfer money from a bank to effectively double their money when the banks repay them.
Sometimes I pop in to a local branch and work in one of their interview rooms if home is busy. I have witnessed OAPs usually, come in and ask to withdraws tens of thousands to pay the man who just did their drive. The staff are very good at explaining it's a likely fraud but the OAPs persist and sometimes the police have to be called under the Banking Protocol arrangements. We can freeze accounts should we need to, to stop money being withdrawn.
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