The unusual suspects

By HELEN LOVELESS, MAIL ON SUNDAY ENTERPRISE EDITOR
Updated:

 

Everyone in the picture below (try enlarging it) has had a crime committed in their name. These unlikely suspects are the innocent victims of a menace that is now far from unusual - identity theft.

Adrian Lowery

Despite taking precautions to protect themselves, six members of the editorial team of Financial Mail and our sister website, thisismoney.co.uk, have fallen prey to identity thieves this year. In Britain, 19% of credit cardholders have had their plastic stolen and used without their permission compared with a Europe-wide figure of only 11%.

Many of these seven million victims, says a European trade association report, have not been reimbursed for losses they incurred. Identity theft costs the UK economy £1.7bn a year. Whether it is online fraud (up 55% this year already), criminals attempting to get bank customers to disclose their key bank details (phishing), or the use of cloned credit cards, this is clearly a real-life crime drama that is coming to an office near you.

JAN – Lauren Mills

Retail correspondent Lauren Mills, 36, was targeted by fraudsters when she tried to cash in the proceeds from a personal equity plan (Pep) held with top investment house M&G.

A week after being told a cheque had been sent by post, Mills had still not received it. M&G agreed to stop the cheque and issue a replacement, which arrived a few days later. Mills paid the cheque into her bank account, only to have it returned to her marked 'payment stopped'.

When she called M&G to demand an explanation, Mills was told that the first cheque had been cashed.

A male fraudster, she was told, had intercepted the cheque in the post and used forged documents to open a bank account with Abbey in Mills's name.

Abbey had failed to notice that the cheque was made out in the name of a married woman and the fraudster was able to clear out the entire sum from the account a few days after paying it in.

It took four months before Mills finally received her money from M&G and an apology. She was also sent a goodwill payment of £100 from Abbey. Mills remains concerned about the failure of M&G and Abbey as well as Royal Mail to protect consumers against identity theft.

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Woman in debt, bills, statement

She says: 'Human error is inevitable from time to time, but this should be a wake-up call for financial institutions that persist in using Royal Mail as a ''safe'' way to deliver money to their customers.'

FEB – Richard Browning

Richard Browning, development director of website thisismoney.co.uk, was targeted by fraudsters in February. He noticed something was amiss when he checked his bank statement and saw that there was a payment for £300 to Dixons - a retailer whose shops he has never visited.

Richard Browning

Concerned, Browning called his bank, First Direct, which immediately cancelled the transaction and reinstated the funds to his account. Though Browning, 40, suffered no financial loss, he says it made him realise just how vulnerable consumers are. 'The banking industry has gone to great lengths to insist its technology is infallible when it has been proved to be extremely fallible,' he says.

'Were I not someone who checks his statements online regularly, my account could have gone in to the red or, worse, the crime could have gone unnoticed.'

APR – Jenny Little

Jenny Little, 31, editor of enterprise, opportunities, franchising and students pages, watches her finances carefully and receives daily text alerts from her bank, First Direct, informing her of her account balance.

Jenny Little

So, knowing she was about £300 in credit, Little was shocked when she received a text saying that she was now £400 overdrawn. When she checked her account, Little discovered a number of fraudulent transactions.

These included a £300 payment made at retailer Argos, a £1.50 purchase in Marks & Spencer and a £50 cashback transaction.

Further investigation showed all the transactions had taken place in Epsom, Surrey. Attempts had also been made by the fraudsters to use a copy of Little's debit card at petrol stations in the area.

Little believes her card was probably skimmed when she was in a bar off Oxford Street, central London, a couple of months before the fraudsters struck. 'I remember the barman disappearing into the kitchen with my card,' she says. 'I thought it was odd at the time. I was amazed at how much the crooks spent in less than 24 hours.'

Thankfully, First Direct's response was prompt. The bank cancelled the card and the stolen money was reimbursed to Little's account within 24 hours.

First Direct made no charge for the overdraft and also sent Little a new card. A fortnight later, the bank called to say that criminals had tried to use her cloned card again at another petrol station, but the transaction was blocked.

Little says she is relieved First Direct sorted out the situation so quickly and efficiently. 'Though First Direct were helpful, I don't know if matters would have been so straightforward if we had been talking about a fraud that ran into thousands of pounds,' she says.

AUG Dan Atkinson

Dan Atkinson

Economics editor Dan Atkinson, 45, was taking his children on a train trip during his summer holidays when criminals managed to clone his HSBC credit card. It happened when he tried to buy tickets with his card from an automatic ticket dispenser in West Sussex.

At first, the machine rejected his card despite the small sum involved. Assuming the machine was faulty, Atkinson used his debit card instead and the transaction went through.

But just to be on the safe side he called HSBC to check there was no problem. He was astonished to hear that there had already been two attempts to draw cash using his credit card. One attempt for £80 had been successful.

'The incident was disturbing,' says Atkinson. 'I have never drawn cash on this card because of the expense involved. Yet a copy of my card was being used in London while the real card was in my possession 30 miles away.'

To claim back his money, Atkinson had to contact the police for a crime reference number. 'Thankfully-they were very helpful and HSBC promptly sent me a replacement card,' he says.

SEPT – Adrian Lowery

Problems started for Adrian Lowery, thisismoney.co.uk news editor, when he applied for an Intelligent Finance credit card so that he could transfer an existing balance from his Mint card.

His application was accepted, but he then noticed the card was taking a long time to arrive. In contrast, his existing Mint card account showed the balance transfer had been made.

How to beat ID fraud

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id fraud

Lowery, 35, was about to call IF to find out where the card was when he received his first statement in the post, showing charges of more than £50 for BT phone calls on top of the balance transfer. Thieves had managed to intercept Lowery's new card in the post.

'I live with a good friend so there is no question of the card being stolen after it was delivered,' says Adrian. 'I realised what had happened before they managed to spend more money on my card.'

When Lowery contacted IF, it cancelled the card and he has now received a new one. He has just returned the fraud forms to IF and is waiting to see if the £50 fraudulently spent will be refunded.

OCT – Michael Clarke

Michael Clarke, 28, is the most recent member of the team to be hit by identity thieves. The difference between his case and that of his colleagues is that his bank is not sure how he became a victim.

Michael Clarke

The problem began when Clarke, a thisismoney.co.uk journalist, mistakenly thought he had lost his HSBC debit card and cancelled it. A new card was ordered, but when it did not turn up he called the bank, which said it was 'on the way'.

Later, his wife Louise, 28, a recruitment consultant, was called at home by HSBC. It said there appeared to be fraud on their account. The bank had been alerted by an 'unusual' transaction for just £1. HSBC said there had also been a transaction of £900 to the website, popcorn.co.uk, which sells children's games and DVDs. The couple-asked HSBC to cancel the payment, which it did. But a closer inspection revealed four other transactions totalling £40.

Clarke had to get a crime number before HSBC would reimburse the money taken fraudulently. And the bank could not say which card had been used in the transactions. 'I have not much confidence that fraud won't happen again,' he says.

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