I have been taken to the police station after being arrested in Tkmaxx 3 weeks ago by the offence “fraud by false representation”. I have been realised after receiving a simple caution, saying that ‘…committed fraud in that you dishonestly made a false representation, namely swapping price labels, intending to make a gain, namely returning goods for cash, for yourself...’ On the day of the incident, after I returned my purchase and left the till, two security guards approached and asked me to go with them. I didn’t even asked why as I was one of their regular customer for a several years, knowing almost each staff and been offered few times an extra discount from the managers or the supervisors for my loyalty. I have been taken to the security room. Firstly they accused me by shoplifting and when I refused this offence, they started to talk about my previous refunds on which they accused me with false representation. I didn’t deny. I said that the returning items are all bought from Tkmaxx but as they were past the 28 day refund policy (unworn/unused items from the past season), I swapped the barcodes with the new items that I bought this season. I do not say that I am innocent as I admit that I foolishly swapped the barcodes, but I didn’t steal anything or returned any items that doesn’t belonged to Tkmaxx. After this long conversation they said they don’t believe me, that I lie and I do the refunds to make a gain. Although I repeat saying they must have the CCTV record and they are able to check it, they interrupt me by saying that they never sold such items. They also add that they need to call the police as this is a case for them. I may say that I was happy to see the police as I thought it would be an opportunity to explain myself. The surprise came out to end my hope at the moment when the police officers asked me to turn back in order to handcuff me and held in custody. I just wanted to die at the moment. 42 years old, never been arrested, didn’t even get any single traffic fine, now taken to the police station for a crime. I was extremely embarrassed, ashamed, stressed, astonished and mostly, worried about my children. At the police station, I was now hardly hearing and trying to understand what was going on when the police officer asked me if I wish to contact my embassy (as am not British) and my solicitor. I was so frightened and felt under pressure as I wasn’t sure where this story was going on and if I might ever see my children again. After I saw the duty solicitor and being interrogated by the police officers, I was free to go with a simple caution and have been warned do not go again to Tkmaxx I paid visit to my job to talk to my manager three days after being arrested and to explain openly the incident. I said I could resign and leave the company willingly if they want to. She said "no need, we know you" She was upset for me and encourage me to get legal advice to clear my name. A week later I received a letter from RLP in which they are asking me to pay £417.47 (£219.97 for the losses and £197.50 for the contribution) I visited the duty solicitor to to get legal advice, he told me to pay this amount. I was googling and trying to get more info about this issue and payed an other visit to the CAB. At CAB they told me to pay this amount in order do not be taking to the court. I called RLP to ask the breakdown and why I will be charged for such amount as Tkmaxx still kept the 3 items they I returned? (the items I returned are not even taken by the police for evidence) I told them that I will contact them later as I will get legal advice. Long story short, can you please tell me * if I really have to pay this amount? *what will happen if I do not pay? can the Debt collector bring me a bailiff? *Can Tkmaxx take me to the court for this unpaid sum? *Can I be found guilty and jailed as I already get a simple caution? thanks for reading and help...

Hi, I received the following email........I don't have a LLoyds account.....!!! Dear customer, For your protection, you must verify this activity before you can continue using your account. We will review the activity on your account with you and upon verification,and we will remove any restrictions placed on your account. Activate your account now > If you choose to ignore our request, you leave us no choice but to temporary suspend your account.Yours sincerely, Lloyds Banking Group Privacy | Site terms and conditions | Accessibility Information | Cookie notice| Site Map Lloyds Bank plc and Bank of Scotland plc (members of Lloyds Banking Group), are authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority. Authorisation can be checked on the Financial Services Register at: www.fca.org.uk

Hi, I could really do with some help. I have been the victim of fraud by a builder working at my property accessing my credit card without my knowledge and running up a huge debt. I very rarely used the card and never received statements in the post. Turns out the statements were being sent but were being accessed and disposed of whilst I was at work. I have been fighting this debt since 2004 with the debt being sold from one debt collection agency to another. Finally Arrow Global instructed Restons Solicitors to take me to Court for the settlement of the outstanding debt which was not caused by me. Unfortunately I lost the court case and the Judge found in the favour of the Bank (they had a better Barrister than me) and now I have to pay back thousands of pounds of debt that I didn't cause. I have been told I cannot appeal the decision. I am being forced to pay the debt whether I like it or not! I am a single mum and cant afford this and shouldn't have to pay something that has nothing to do with me. I have offered a payment of £50 a month just to keep them quiet but they have rejected my offer. They want nearly £300 per month which I cannot afford. Does anybody know who I can talk to clear my name or is it too late now I have gone to court? They also want to do a charge on my property that I don't want. I have since found out this Builder has a criminal record and has done the same [problem] to other people. If anybody knows how I can deal with this, it would be appreciated. The Police were made aware initially when I first found out what was going on , but were unable to help me, stating it was up to the Bank or Credit Card company to protect me as the Consumer and their Customer. I certainly haven't been protected in any way shape or form.

************************Hi need help urgently***************.... on 11th august 2015 around 2330 at night i received a text messages from barclaycrad to confirm some transaction my card, there were transaction that i had used on 10th and 11th to which i replied Yes( HOW WRONG WAS I) I was at home with my mother and a friend of my mother, i than received further emails and messages from barclaycard that my credit card was used for £3500 on virgngames.com (gambling site) also £280 was taken from my paypal account. i called barclaycard and reported it straight away it was around 0130 in the morning 3 minutes before the last transactions that was done on my account, barclaycard blocked, issued me a new card and sent me a dispute form to fill out and send it back. i did and got a full refund within 10 days, and from paypal. however barclaycard fraud team have now contacted me again few weeks ago and asking me to fill out another form which stated FRAUD DECLARATION FORM to fill and send it back, again i did and they wanted bank statement, prove of my passport payslip basically everything... .. i done that and it proved that i do not gamble. however barclaycard spokesmen was so rude and aggressive and was trying to pin it on me, saying all my details like mother middle name, IP address, Email verification and all my details matches and if i was drunk and did not know that i did it, REALLY!!!!! he called me and said if i was sure that i want to go ahead with this case, i said yes and he stated i would get a decision within 5days through he post, 8 days went pass nothing, i than get a call saying he and a senior investigation team want to come and see me face to face and speak to me and make sure there arent any misunderstanding, i have no problem and said sure lets meet, but i am worried of what might happen i have reported it to action fraud, spoken to Citizen advice bureau, spoken to police and not sure what to do, they are calling me after 3 months after initial fraud and trying to pin this on me now!!!! help what do i do, any advice about why the meeting as they are coming from north of england and i live in south of england and why the meeting?? they have treated me really bad as if i am the suspect!!!:-x:-x:x:|

I don't know where to start, I have recently come to terms with the fact that my relationship is toxic. I have been with my mentally and sometimes physically abusive partner for almost 14 years and we have 3 children together. He doesn't cope well at all with anything and I do my best to take it all on. Some years ago the bank decided to withdraw his overdraft and we were left with zero money a few days after payday, with pretty much all the bills to pay and the rest of the month to actually live. We already had debt and I had nobody to turn to for a favour of borrowing money. I did something so stupid I cant believe I did it, I started talking out payday loans in both mine and his names without his knowledge or consent. I have committed fraud and now I want out of the relationship and I don't know what's going to happen to me or my children. Right now Im sat upstairs down the side of my youngest childs cot in the dark trying to type through the tears - Iv lived with this secret for years, I cannot leave the house until I have seen the postman come and go just incase he brings a letter. I just need to know what will happen when all this comes to light. I don't have the money to pay it off and I cant live like this anymore. Today something really bad happened and I just don't want to bring my children up in this environment any longer but Im so so scared of what will happen about all the fraud/debt. Can anybody give me any guidance please? Im so ashamed of myself and this doesn't make any of it any better but I didn't do it to fund fancy clothes or days out it was to live

hey. in august i received a letter stating i was + £2000 over payed in housing benefits. i phoned my housing officer up she stated that it was cos i didnt provided my payslips even though i did for the first 3 month and then got told i didn't have to any more. so instead of putting my pay slip in i said i would pay it all back in monthly installments which they agreed to. my partner got a job 4 month after i did and had his jsa got cut off so in turn we stupidly thought that the housing benefit had been stopped as well because he was the main claimer. we did not pay our rent for a couple of month because we was trying to get on our feet and making sure we had gas elec and food in thinking later we would catch up with our rent when we was sorted now we he has received a letter saying he is to go to a interview under cation. i am seriously stressing out over this i am an over thinker and am thinking of all the nightmares that could happen. please could some one help?

Banks are refusing to pay compensation to card fraud victims based on nothing more than a "hunch", while others are forced to wait longer than four weeks to get their money back. An investigation by Which? showed that banks are “inconsistent” when it comes to handling fraud claims. Worryingly, banks appear to be refusing compensation to genuine fraud victims. The FOS said that while it had seen some improvements, in many cases banks have based their decisions “on a hunch”, without conducting a full investigation. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/bank-accounts/11869596/Banks-refusing-to-repay-card-fraud-victims-based-on-a-hunch.html

Hi Everyone, I'm going to tell you my experience to date so that others may learn from it. It's not quite over yet but I think it will be by next week. Feel free to ask me any questions. I live in SW Scotland and in Feb 2014 I approached a local family run company to quote for double glazed replacement windows. The sales director sent me the quote from his email address. I responded with a query and then accepted the quote by email. His email address was then automatically added to my Outlook email address book. The work was carried out in May 2014. The fitters did a really good job and I love the windows so there's no problem there. The problem started on 2nd June 2014. I received an invoice from the company asking me for immediate payment but that invoice didn't give me one jot of information on how to pay them. In fact it was very poor, it had no company reg number and no T & Cs either. I sent a quick email to the sales director (using the address already stored in Outlook) asking for payment details. I got a response which mentioned 'New bank account' signed by the director from the sales director's email address. I logged onto my bank account (Cahoot) and setup the payment online. This all happened early afternoon. Then around 4:30pm I received a second email from the sales director's email address but signed by the girl in the office. It gave me different bank details. I presumed that the company were in the process of changing bank accounts and that maybe the directors hadn't communicated it yet to the staff. It was too late in the day to check with them when I picked up the email. At about 7:30 that night Cahoot performed a security call. In it they asked me if the payment was going to the windows company to which I said yes. The next day I received an email from the sales director asking me where the money was because they hadn't received it. I was given the run around until the 11th June when I had become very suspicious and stopped communicating with him. In the meantime the bank were trying to trace where the money had gone. They sent me the necessary proof on the 20th June. I then got in touch with the company and sent the document to them on a different email address. I told them they could now put pressure on Barclays bank because they had definitely received the money. They instantly replied asking why Barclays when they were with Bank of Scotland. I sent them all the previous emails and the girl in the office phoned me and said they had never sent the emails to me. She asked me what I intended to do and I said I was going to phone the police, which I did. The police investigation is ongoing and there are now 8 other victims none of them to do with the windows company. Not once did this company try to talk to me or investigate the circumstances. Their first response was when I was on the phone to the office girl and the sales director was asking in the background if I was insured. The next thing they did was get a solicitor involved and sent me a demand to pay up. I went to my own solicitor and showed her the email. She told me I have paid. The company did a few things that made me very suspicious about them. They never chased me for the payment when I had told them they should received my payment by 3rd June at the latest and they deleted all their emails which were police evidence. I had my computer checked to ensure I hadn't been hacked which I hadn't. I then had the email headers looked at by a computer expert and they have shown that the so called fraudulent email was sent to me via the window company's server. It looks as if someone within the company logged onto a google email account (which is largely anonymous) and somehow intercepted my email but not quickly enough to stop another person in the company from also seeing my email. My next step was to complain to my bank. There had been no warnings on their screens to tell me that I wasn't protected by the Faster Payments System or that they don't check the account name. The bank's response was to tell me they didn't want the criminals to know this! I said if that was the case they could have told me during the security call. They dismissed my complaint. I went to the Financial Ombudsman. The adjudicator also dismissed my complaint twice but I appealed and it finally reached the Financial Ombudsman. The bank had very conveniently lost the recording of the security call but somehow the FO managed to get them to find it. It was because of that security call that she upheld my complaint. She says that the bank led me to believe that they checked the account name. She also said that the bank had authorised the payment and not me. She ruled that the bank should re-imburse me for all my legal costs, the debt owed to the window company and any other costs so that I am not out of pocket. This decision was made in May 2015 from my initial complaint in Aug 2014. My solicitor was amazed at what I had achieved. I would say that the Faster Payments System is not secure enough. The customer has no way of checking that the bank details provided by a company actually belong to that company. Criminals are now putting people into companies to spot loopholes in their security/admin procedures in order to send out fraudulent bank details to unsuspecting victims like me. You could ring a company to ask them for their bank details and the person you were speaking to could give you their personal information and you would be none the wiser. There is nowhere to verify that an account belongs to a company. Once you have paid the money it is impossible to get it back unless the bank made the error. I believe that in other countries they use a third check like the company reg number or an NI number. When the bank finally got in touch with me in August this year I asked them who makes the decisions on the court case if they are now paying. They said that I do no matter what the cost! They also said that they didn't want me to settle out of court and they wanted the hearing to go ahead. I have put in endless hourss of work on this and accumulated some very good evidence to defend my case. A legal debate is scheduled for 22nd October but my solicitor wants to use Counsel for the debate. They are saying they have struggled to find anything in law to help them and have had to go right back to Victorian law. They say the contract was formed via email and the company should have ensured that their email system was secure because I had relied on it. At the mention of Counsel the bank have started squirming. They rang me on the 22nd and said they were refusing to indemnify me after that date. I went back to the Financial Ombudsman with this information and she told me that wasn't quite what had been discussed. So everything is currently up in the air with the case. It looks very much like I will have to settle out of court because I cannot afford to fund this on my own. If the criminals are part of the company they will receive the money twice. I had hoped that the bank would help me see this case through to its conclusion so that I could have possibly had an outcome good enough to help others that follow in my footsteps. I may never know who was responsible for sending me that email because the police are just following the money. I now have a lovely set of windows with no guarantee.

Hi all, Interesting question, have been asked to attend an interview under caution. Regarding not reporting a change in circumstances, Basically I forgot to tell them that my partners wages had gone up, this meant we were no longer entitled to hb, now I am very ill with my mental health, have been for years and therefore very forgetful and unmotivated, as such I haven't told them, now my wife works as a carer all day then comes home to look after me, so she hasn't really had the time either, I'm the lead claimant, so if this was to go to court, would it be me that is prosecuted as it's totally my fault, we live in Stafford if that helps, Thanks Andrew

Hi folks, So I'm in a bit of a complicated situation, I'll try to sum it up as briefly as possible. I guess I'm just curious what people think/advice/am I doing the right thing/anything else I could do? Last year I split up with my ex. I knew he had looked into some sort of tax credits scenario a few months before we split, however I never filled in any forms and never saw any money, thus thought no more of it. In June of this year I discovered he's been claiming joint couples working tax credits under both our names since last year. When phoning the HMRC about this they "fixed" their records, and proceeded to inform me that "overpayment letters" would likely be sent out. I told them I'd never received any money nor signed a form, nor knew he was doing this, they told me that I "must have" signed a form. I got C.A.B advice and did a Subject Access Request for the initial application forms (as I disputed the existence of a signature), and while waiting for these to arrive I asked a solicitor for help and also (on a particularly stressful day) phoned my ex and told him to get this sorted out. He said he would, unforunately he uh... doesn't believe in working. Seriously. I don't think he works at all. So I can't really see how he can pay this back, and if he can't, they'll still chase me, right? Even though I never got the money and work hard every week to pay my bills! The solicitor was skeptical about the lack of signature on the form, and I was even starting to doubt myself as to whether I had inadvertantly signed the form as the last few months of our relationship were pretty horrible/a bit of a haze of stress. Solicitor suggested he would send a letter to the HMRC explaining that I did not know about the claim, received no money, and for them to only chase my ex for the money. This letter was sent over a month ago, still no response for HMRC. The past two weeks - letters start flooding in. Firstly, the fruits of my Subject Access Request labour - a massive envelope containing, among other things, the initial application form. It is entirely filled out in my ex's handwriting, and there are NO SIGNATURES on it at all. Not his, nor mine. I can't see why these would be redacted (perhaps his, but why mine? Especially when I asked for it specifically?). Finally, this week I've received two "notices to pay" for overpayments to my ex totalling about £4500. They have been sent to him too (he's told me in an email he's dealing with it). I just don't trust that he will when he thought it was ok to do this in the first place, and also where is he getting £4500 from?? The deadline for re-paying this is in October! If he has no money/offers a tiny monthly repayment, they might still come after me? I've thought of phoning them to say "hey guys, no signature, why are you chasing me?" but I thought it best to wait and see what the solicitor thinks. So that's pretty much where it's at. I've told my solicitor about the S.A.R news and am waiting to hear from him... what a mess! Hope I'm approaching it the right way.

Hi. Looking for a bit of help. We have been stung by an unscrupulas seller. My 17yr old son bought a car for spares or repair, it needed quite a lot of work on it, it was a non runner. But based on purchasing the parts and doing the work myself, it was still a reasonable deal. If a garage was to have carried out the work it was over £500.00 of labour and around £300.00 of parts. So I bought the parts and did it myself. Now we have a letter from Santander saying they have an interest in the car (HPI outstanding) and have a claim on the car. I want to know what rights I have, the car was only worth £450.00 as a non runner but now I have repaired it its worth £1000.00. Do I have any rights, can I claim anything? The car was purchased in good faith, receipt was issued and the V5 supplied. Seller not interested in helping. Before the cries of should have had a HPI check, know that now, the initial cost was low and only student savings to pay for it, we only did basic checks, but car + repair cost its now worth a lot more.... Any ideas (legal) of any steps I can take.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lincolnshire-34172701 I think that this tells you lot about the private private parking industry, its culture and the culture of many of the people who are involved in it. Apart from anything else, how can UKPC have such slack systems that it is possible for someone to interfere with recorded video in this way. It is shabby and clearly the directors of the company have fallen well short of proper standards. Of course what else do you expect from people who might equally be involved in night-club door security or fitting car sound systems or burglar alarms had they not become involved in the bounty-hunting industry. I wonder if their families know what they do for living? Remember Parking Eye? Follow this link to see what the Court of Appeal had to say about them. Of course, where is the BPA? It is the BPA which apparently imposes standards on their members. Clearly they don't do a very good job either if they allow such vulnerable systems to be in place.

Hello All Heres my story, A few months back I sold 4 x Seagate 4tb Hard Disk drives on Ebay at (£110 each). The buyer had these in his possession for just under four weeks then decided to open a returns case as one drive was defective. I didn't discover this at fist for the first few days as I work offshore, soon as I did I agreed to the return as the items were still in warranty. The buyer ignored this and then claimed all disks were faulty the same day as Ebay made a decision on the returns case. I contacted Ebay via webchat (i still have the records) and was advised not to issue a refund until I had the goods back and that they would sent a prepaid sticker. A few days later buyer then registered the prepaid tracking number and instantly Ebay refunded them without any checks. I contacted them again via webchat and asked why they had done this and that its highly suspicious and that I'm concerned I may not get my original items back, They stated if that was the case them contact then immediately with evidence and they will review the refund. Few days later my guess was right, the buyer has returned an ancient Western Digital drive of 320gb capacity. I took pictures straight away of this and sent them to Ebay including pics I took of the drives before dispatch listing serial numbers and being individually wrapped prior to pick up by a courier. Ebay then responds by saying that my claim will not be upheld as the have no way of telling what was returned and they will not review the case despite all the evidence I gave, followed their own procedure and guidelines, done everything I was instructed to done. I have contacted their useless call center who have lied consistently to me advising someone will look into this and when I called today they more or less accused me of engineering the entire ordeal. I also pointed out on their site it states "The buyer must return the item in the same condition in which it was received." only to be told there is no such requirement. So now the buyer has my items and the money and I'm left with a useless old brick. Ebay wont even discuss it anymore. I'm not letting this go, whats the next course of action here.

My sister comiited fraud in 2007 and recieved a police caution, she does not know I know this. she was asked in June this year to attend a police interview where again she was charged with fraud using her landlord details obtained an online catalogue account and bought £5000.00 worth of goods, she is in court magistrates, she's pleading guilty (her husband) does not know this . Will the magistrates take into account her police caution when sentencing and what sentence will she get

Hi all, Can anyone help out? Do you have any information on the following company. https://www.instantdecisionloans.co.uk/ or has anyone heard of them or had any dealings with them? A colleague of mine has unfortunately been duped by them out of circa £500. A police report is in the process of being filled out for fraud. He is currently cancelling his card and changing his account details so that they can no longer take money from him. any info on these would be great if anyone has had dealings with them. Thanks

Hi all, hopefully I'm posting this in the right section To cut a long story short, my mum went to Uganda back in May, during her time there [i suspect] she was a victim of 'skimming' and around £700 went missing from her bank account. When she got back to the UK, we took a look at her statement and the ~£700 was withdrawn from various ATM's around Kampala in increments over a few days. Barclays bank did initially cover my mum's losses whilst they supposedly opened an investigation, but just a few days ago, they basically sent her a letter saying that because her card uses the chip and pin stuff, it had to be her withdrawing the cash and that she needs to pay all of the money back. I've done a bit of reading and banks in the UK don't seem to acknowledge that skimming a chip and pin debit card is a thing and automatically place the blame on the victim of the fraud. Is there anything at all that my mum and I can do? Thanks in advance

People who are the victims of so-called "vishing" [problem]s cannot always rely on their bank to compensate them, a study has suggested. In nearly two-thirds of cases the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) found that banks were not responsible for victims' losses. It looked at 200 examples of the telephone fraud, in which account holders lost up to £100,000 each. But it ruled that the bank was liable for those losses in only 37% of cases. In 63% of them, consumers were left without compensation, having, in effect, given their own money away. As a result it is warning that account holders need to be much more aware of the risks. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-33386934

Hi everyone. I'm new to these forums and I'm not sure if I am posting in the correct place. Please feel free to point me in the right direction if it's better suited somewhere else. Although this story is fairly long, I will try and explain it the best I can. I am speaking on behalf of my Father because he has dyslexia and finds it difficult to read and write well. Back in 2005 my Father owned a fairly successful business but he was having trouble with the bookkeeping and accounts. Around this time, he was approached by a company called Barrington Finance, who told him that they were able to help him sort his difficulties out and get his books and accounts in order. Shortly after, the director of Barrington finance decided he wanted to leave his job and be in partnership with my Father, as he was bored of his job and wanted to take a new direction. The director then introduced my Father to a bank manager who worked at Natwest. My Fathers new business partner, and the manager of Natwest advised my Father to remortgage his home for £100'000 and to put the money in to an account for a new business venture my Father set up. The bank manager opened up 3 separate business accounts for different business's for my father and his new business partner, with an overdraft facility on 2 accounts. A mandate was set in place for the accounts, which stated that money could only be withdrawn/transferred with two signatures. That of my Fathers, and his new business partner. Around 8 months after these accounts were set up, my Father noticed some suspicious activity within his business, he then went in branch to check one of the accounts (the one he had put the £100'000 in), to find that the account had been closed and all the money had been taken out. He was at a complete loss for words as he had only authorised one transaction over that period. He knew straight away that his new business partner was involved in the disappearance of the money and the account closure. Upon viewing the bank statements of these accounts, there had been withdrawals of large sums of money which were not authorised by my Father. He immediately reported the matter to the police to which they said they could not do anything until they received confirmation from the bank that these fraudulent actions had taken place. He then approached the bank and reported the theft to the bank assistant to which they passed onto the managers. The manager did agree that fraudulent activity had been taking place and asked him to put it in writing so they can investigate further into the matter. The case was then passed onto the fraud investigation department. Whilst this investigation was happening (it took almost two years) the bank itself made a claim against my Father for the £10000 overdraft facility. He tried to inform the bank that their bank manager had authorised the overdraft and is involved in the theft and the unauthorised transactions taken out of the accounts. In the end, the claim that my Father was trying to make was not taken to court because Natwest said that the £10’000 overdraft he apparently owed and the disappearance of the £100’000 were not related. Before Natwest took my Father to court, he had payed around £7000 in legal costs trying to take them to court. After all of this happened, my Father lost his business, our family home… everything he had ever worked hard for. In 2008, my dad had to pay back the £10’000. He has suffered a tremendous amount of stress and depression from this ordeal, and we are all suffering to this very day. that is the general background to the story. I hope it wasn’t too difficult to follow for those of you that are still reading this. Of course there are further points to make but it would take way too long to explain on this forum. I have a few important questions to ask and some key points to elaborate on When my Father saw the account transactions, it showed that money was been transferred to his business partners account, his business partners WIFES account and then to the other two business accounts that were set up. When he asked Natwest to show him WHO authorised these transactions (there were 21 account transfers) they said that this is only kept on file in a note system for a very short period of time and then destroyed. Is this true? So if you have a large sum of money in an account that is only allowed withdrawal/transactions with two signatures, they have NO evidence to show who allowed this to happen? 2) Before the mandate was set in place and signed by my father and his business partner, £10’000 was withdrawn out of the account in cash, with only 1 signature, the signature of his business partner! This was BEFORE the mandate was even set in place! Surely this is enough evidence? And surely this is completely in breach of the contract??? 3) The bank manager of natwest was over-riding my fathers authority and allowing my fathers business partner to transfer the money without his permission. What is even more astounding is that the bank manager of Natwest was SACKED in 2008 due to gross misconduct. But they did not mention this at court?! Fastforward to 2015, we have now taken this case to the Financial Ombudsman. I sent off a case file that has all evidence and documents pertaining to the investigation back in 2007/8. The court had ordered Natwest to release all their documents of their investigation so EVERYTHING they did/said is all here with me in a file. before the case was passed on to the adjudicator, another person who was dealing with it beforehand said that Natwest have not issued my Father with a deadlock letter . can the ombudsman make a decision without the deadlock letter? We have asked the Ombudsman time and time again to get the deadlock letter from the bank but he has ignored these requests. He said that because it happened so long ago , Natwest have told him they haven't kept the case on file. BUT we have everything here on file because as I said earlier, the court ordered Natwest to release everything they were doing on the investigation back in 2007/08. What are the chances of my Father getting anywhere with this case since it has been more than six years? I would greatly appreciate everyones thoughts, comments and suggestions . If you have any questions that you would like to ask then please feel free to do so. Thank you for reading.

Hello, I wrote a huge long detailed post but am aware these can be viewed via google (that's how I found this site) and am so so scared. my husband died in a terrible work accident in 2008 and there was no body. I was left with our 2 small children and you can imagine how awful and difficult it was. We'd claimed TC on his pretty low income (I also had a self employed pocket money job but mainly was stay at home mum), and it was extremely difficult for me to sort out his affairs as I I couldn't easilly get a death cert without his body. It was a horrific time. We got a charitable payout from his work (which didn't count as taxable income) and lived on this, the rolling TC's and kindness of friends/family. in 2009 after some 10 months I got an interim death cert and I also got more freelance work so informed TC accordingly of estimated pay and hours and sent them the death cert. Also around this time my husband's body was found - it was so traumatic I can't tell you but that's not an excuse for my behaviour. I am not making excuses for what I’m about to post next or excuse my actions but I cannot begin to describe the trauma we endured and the effect on me and how really, I didn’t place any importance on money stuff – just surviving. I've also suffered increasing anxities and depression and after years of meltdowns in the Drs, I was recently referred to a psychiatrist who diagnosed me with a mental health condition (he says brougt on by trauma) and given medication. Again, this is no excuse but just some background. I think I have committed TC fraud but I don’t know the extent. I began to emerge from the ‘fog’ a bit probably around 2012 and only recently am I realising the whole horror of my potential negligence. So here is what I think I may have done. - Not declared my widowed parents allowance from when I got it in 2009 to 2013 (I am not sure when I told my accountant I got it). I think I have just told TC of my income from 2009 – 2013 but WPA totals about £2800 each year. - Not properly declared all my correct income – this is so irresponsible I CANNOT believe I would ever have behaved so recklessly but I can’t describe how little importance I placed on all this – I just can’t get my head round why I was so laissez fair about it all. I think I have a fuzzy recollection of just doing my annual declarations from memory and the TC person asking “has anything changed?” and me replying casually, “Oh no, it’s all the same.” I just had no idea of the importance of accuracy and guessed at it based loosely on memory of previous years. I started to get my act together a couple of years ago and I do know for sure is that for the last two financial years, my claim has been totally accurate . It may even be 3 years of accuracy but my record keeping has been so slapdash that I have no idea. I rang to do my annual renewal ‘properly’ yesterday and during the process the person said, that something had flagged up that needed checking back to 2012-13. After the call I dug about for any paper work for that period but couldn’t find any so started started panicking about what it could be and whether I had declared my pension. I phoned TC straight away and said I was worried about whether they had had my pension figures for last few years but the woman SO unhelpful and said she couldn’t check and those years had been ‘signed off’ anyway. I kept saying, “But if I’ve done something wrong please can you tell me how I can go about putting it right?” She just told me there was nothing I could do now. I begged to speak to someone else who could help me but she said there wasn’t anyone. I have been sobbing ever since, filled with terror that I have now with that call aroused suspicion on top of these sinister sounding ‘checks’ they tell me they need to do. I’ve read you can go to prison for 7 years. I am trying to take control and have today ordered bank statements back to 2010 and asked my accountant for copies of my tax return s and accounts from 2009 to present (he does my returns not me) and I really need copies of my WFTC award notices from 2010 to see if the figures correspond but what do I do if they don’t? I am desperate to put this right and terrified beyond belief of going to prison and my kids who have already lost so much, losing me too. I can’t eat or sleep and even phoned the Samaritans today as just felt so worthless, ashamed and broken. My poor children are so innocent and look to me to teach them right from wrong but I am so shabby and shameful i don't feel fit to be their mother. I want to ‘own up’ but I don’t know the extent or exactly what I may or may not have done. I keep thinking of all the other knock on implications like the free prescriptions I have got over the years and local authority passes to swimming pool we get in this area if on TCs. My children also get a charitable monthly payment from my a charity related to my husband’s work that is means tested and if I have committed fraud then there is all this to consider too. Since 2009 to present the total WFTC/CTC payments have come to something like £48,500. If I thought selling my house and giving all the money back to TCs would solve the problem I would but I know it is not that easy. Is there anyone who can help me untangle this mess and put it right? Thank you. ps is there any way we can delete threads if we are worried about what we may have publically disclosed?

People who are the victims of so-called "vishing" scams cannot always rely on their bank to compensate them, a study has suggested. In nearly two-thirds of cases the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) found that banks were not responsible for victims' losses. It looked at 200 examples of the telephone fraud, in which account holders lost up to £100,000 each. But it ruled that the bank was liable for those losses in only 37% of cases. In 63% of them, consumers were left without compensation, having, in effect, given their own money away. As a result it is warning that account holders need to be much more aware of the risks. "We really want to share what we are seeing in the complaints we handle, and encourage people to get talking about scams with their friends and relatives so they become more alert to the risks," said Caroline Wayman, the chief ombudsman. More ...

Received a letter today asking me to attend an interview under caution next week. I'm unemployed but my wife works part time 24 hours a week we claim tax credits and get help with housing and council tax ,then the new law came in where you had to work 30+ hours I can't find work so wife took about prt time job. She started just covering the odd shift around March as this wasn't permanent and wasn't going to be till September when the person doing the job went to uni. when the job became hers in September I waited 2 weeks then wrote a letter to benefits inclosing 2 pay slips. That was the end of it, nearly 2 years later benefits write to us asking to provide pay slips, so we send the stuff off they wanted. I then receive a letter about overpayment on housing and council benefits also wanted to no wife's start date on 2nd job ,thought this was strange. I rang them up and they informed me they didn't no my wife had a 2nd job, I told them I sent a letter to inform them and 2 pay slips,they said they never received anything. I got the date my wife started 2 hd job sent that plus the p65 week later received more letters saying we owed over 3k, spoke again on the phone due to them not knowing about the 2nd job we owed this money. They asked if I wanted to appeal it I said it was a waste of time as its my word against there's regarding the letter, I no for a fact I sent it, so they misplaced it or lost in post I was also told cause I'm not appealing it won't go any further. i was told the pay back plan and been paying this since, now 8 months later called in for interview Anyone offer any advice for me as I'm bricking them,the only thing I'm at fault with is not declaring the work she did before the job came permament.

I applied for student visa in 2011 with the help of 1 consultancy. They charged me £1600 for this service. I done bio metric and was waiting for reply till today. In between i communicated to UKBA several times . Today i came to know that i am victim of identity theft. This consultancy who helped me for my application, withdrew my application without my concern. Even they changed my communication address to their office address without my knowledge. I never authorized them to represent my file to UKBA because they are not registered as OISC. I just took help to fill the form, find the college. Now after longtime waiting for an application i contacted to UKBA for returned my documents as i wanted to go back home. They told me that my application was withdraw with the reason that my mother is passed away in 2011 . So they returned that documents to that consultancy address . UKBA advise me to take help of local police to go and get my documents. i done so but the owner of the company denied. now police advice me to go to County court to sue him. Please advice me if someone can help 1 Is it possible for someone to change my application address in UKBA without my knowledge 2 How can i get my documents back

Hi, I wonder if anyone can tell me, after an IUC do you get a letter to say that they are going to prosecute? and can you appeal their decision to prosecute? Many thanks in advance

Hi! (I have literally just joined this site so apologies if I do anything wrong!) I will try to keep this as concise as poss - I recently got into trouble on a bus when I accidentally used my boyfriend's 16+ zip Oyster instead of mine (I have an 18+ student one). Like most people, I got v worried about this after googling what could happen - I'm a medical student so prospect of a criminal record is v v v scary! Got the standard letter asking for an explanation - sought advice from head of my faculty, turns out this has happened to many students before, and she suggested going in to hand in my response letter in person, and try to speak to them in person and halt the investigation in its tracks. I did so today. Spoke to a lawyer at TFL HQ, he said he believed that it was an honest mistake (which it truly was!!) and he referred me on to the investigator in charge, who thankfully offered to settle for £300. Although this seems a bit steep, I am glad I am no longer facing a criminal record. However, in the email he sent me, he said this: 'Please be aware that a guilty plea in court could result in the fines and costs being lower than an out of court settlement as they would take into account the individuals mitigation and means.' I spoke to a friend who recently did the same thing as me, and he ended up pleading guilty via post and paying only £120 - and got no criminal record from it? This confused me, as I thought that going to court and pleading guilty = criminal record!? So, my question now is - obviously the prospect of a lower fine is desirable (I'm a student with no income other than student loan/grant!), however, won't I get a criminal record from going to court and pleading guilty?? If not, should I go to court, get the lower fine, and try to not get a criminal record (if that's possible can somebody please explain what I need to do?) or should I just pay up the £300 now? Thank you so much for taking the time to read this!

Action Fraud has seen an increase in the number of small to medium sized businesses being contacted by fake bailiffs requesting payments for a phantom debt. The [problem] involves the business being cold called from someone purporting they are bailiffs working on behalf of a court, attempting to recover funds for a non-existent debt. The caller will then request payment by means of bank transfer and if this is refused, will threaten to visit the premises to recover the debt that is owed. A range of different businesses are being targeted; including Nurseries, Manufacturers, Hotels and Taxi Services. http://www.granthammatters.co.uk/action-fraud-warns-of-fake-bailiffs-phantom-debts/