A Fool And His Money...

Philip Moore said his world fell apart when a man who called himself David rang from Natwest's listed customer services number at around 8.30pm on September 7.

Oh oh!

A series of phone calls followed over the next three days where the man, who claimed to be based in Bristol, told the father-of-three fraudsters were trying to hack his business accounts and make thousands of pounds of withdrawals.

Gosh, really? I hope they didn't try to get you to do something totally implaus...

Ah.

He urged him to move all his money from his business and personal accounts to a holding account set up in his name with Barclays.

Because banks do that, don't they? Suggest a rival bank?

It was only when the 41-year-old rang back later to ask a question that he discovered no such employee existed.

You'd need a heart of stone, wouldn't you?

Mr Moore said: "He knew so much about me and my account, his call came from a recognised number. I was so panicked by what he was telling me I just acted.

"This is the worst thing that has ever happened to me. I have no idea how I am going to survive financially. I'm living off the small amounts of money I make with my part-time taxi service at the moment.

"The money was to help me launch by new business venture - a pillow to reduce snoring - in November so now I don't know what to do. I think I'm going to have to re-mortgage my house.

"I've had a breakdown about it and am now on medication.

"I wished there was a protocol in place which meant the cashier should question such a big transaction."

Oh, gosh, yes! We'd all love to have yet more hoops to jump through to get our money because some people have a room temp IQ!

"I'm worried the man had been an employee as he knew so much."

He just knew more than you. Not hard, you'd think. But then....

"I've been a victim of fraud before and the bank recovered the money..."

/facepalm

Sussex Police do not investigate such cases of fraud unless they class the victim as vulnerable. Instead, they refer them to Action Fraud, which happened in this incident.

I'm not sure he shouldn't be classed as 'vulnerable'. He should certainly be classed as something!