Why should we all pay for those who’ve been scammed?

Judging others on the basis of a basic summary, when their reality was months of the criminal getting to know them, drip feeding a story to them, testing out what works on them, finding out their insecurities, learning all about their hopes and dreams, is just being crass and not even trying to understand why they might have ended up looking and behaving like an easily manipulated fool.

Well, that’s just an idiotic comparison. With a romance scam, the criminal has spent months building a relationship of trust with their victim and breaking down their defences. They get into that person’s psyche in a very personal, humiliating, calculating way, gambling on the fact the person may well be too embarrassed ever to admit it, giving them free rein to move on to the next victim. They groom their victims, like people traffickers might well have done, or sex abusers. Do you also take this attitude to women who form relationships with men who then rape and humiliate them?

Preying on people’s understanding of themselves and their ability to trust anyone at all ever again is nothing like getting distracted and knowing you have done something that leaves you open to opportunists you knew not to trust in the first place because they never made any effort to convince you otherwise.

If one of your parents got defrauded in this way and lost their life savings (and potentially your inheritance) I imagine you'd be glad that the bank returned the money.

But what do you do when the target insists on going ahead (as noted upthread) ?

Be cause banks should have adequate anti-fraud protection tien built into their apps and systems to prevent vulnerable people from being affected

Many scammers are sophisticated and take a multi-pronged approach. I know of someone, a widow, who during the first lockdown was persuaded to invest some money (I don’t know what in) and the chap contacting her was both very plausible and charming. After months and months she felt they had a real connection, and he was coming to see her, but covid etc always got in the way. It was called out by her her hairdresser as at her first appointment after one of the lockdowns finished, she was giddy with excitement. Hairdresser managed to contact the son (lady was in her 70’s) but she wouldn’t believe anyone, this chap was utterly lovely. In the end she lost £70,000 in “investments”, and once she finally realised it was all a scam she had a stroke and died.

Many of you will be delighted to know nothing was paid back.

It is theft and quite horrid. I’m sure an awful lot isn’t reported because of the shame and victim blaming.

news.sky.com/story/adults-aged-under-34-twice-as-likely-to-fall-victim-to-fraud-than-other-age-groups-survey-finds-12741799

You trust them under coercion whilst lacking confidence in them. I feel the same way.

There may be some "extremely sophisticated scams out there" but the majority are not at all sophisticated. They're not complex. The romance scams are not sophisticated. The lottery/money laundering scams are not sophisticated the WhatsApp mum scam, the delivery notice, the text from your bank...none of them are sophisticated. The vast majority are the opposite of sophisticated and have been warned about a million times. People STILL willingly give their money away.

@FudgeSundae when it comes to housing or groceries or fuel bills- absolutely - romance scans- nope- that's common sense totally out the window

What about people who invest in fraudulent investment schemes because they have been convinced they will make loads of money? Should we just tell people they were not only stupid but also greedy, so don’t deserve their money back? How about people who let banks convince them to sign up to PPI schemes? They were all bloody stupid too, weren’t they? Let’s throw all the idiots to the wolves…

Well i think the comparison is relevant if I am worrying about the morality of what the banks are spending ‘our money’ on and how it affects me.

I would rather them spend my money on the victims of romance fraud even if they were stupid than their boss’ bonuses.

I’m not angered by them spending a small amount on victims - but I am by the other ways they choose to spend my money. Just my opinion…

Well you might not pay for it if you don't pay bank charges and interest, but if you do then you will.

The banks will put up their charges and mortgage rates to cover their losses.

@Raisinganiguana - do you want a situation instead where banks are allowed to insist on seeing your private medical information to check whether you might be on the road to a dementia or poor mental health diagnosis; or are allowed to tell you that they will not compensate you in your case because they think you are actually just stupid and only a stupid person would ever behave like you?…

Well it does if you’re worried about the bank using our money which was your original gripe with them paying out to romance fraud victims.

There are extremely sophisticated scams out there - tons of it where people masquerade as legitimate organisations, skins that are put over bank apps so that someone things they are being asked to legitimately do something, as well as all the usual really convincing HMRC and benefits ones. Have you seen the latest MSE warning that there is a letter being sent out to people at the moment claiming you can claim back tax.... it's actually legitimate but people are so wary of scams now that they think it's more fakery. Sure if you fall for something obvious you might think 'well I obviously wouldn't fall for that' but scams are increasingly complex. I work in a huge organisation with many educated and on the ball people but we have to continuously warn against all sorts of scams because they're NOT obvious and they don't target the elderly and vulnerable- they target everyone indiscriminately.

Speak for yourself, but I still don't trust banks.

To be fair they don't trust us either.

As a thought perhaps we should all have scam insurance?

Not sure how that would work in view of most insurance companies' T&Cs, @Raisinganiguana? Generally speaking, if something happens you couldn't have foreseen that's fine, but if it's your own fault you're on your own

Ages ago there was a poster whose young DS had just run up an online game debt on her card for the THIRD time, only unlike the first two the bank were refusing compo and she was going berserk because they'd dared to suggest she should have taken more care

A bit different to an outright scam of course, bt the overall point seems to be that some just don't want to accept responsibility

Trust, by definition, is to put someone into a position where they could harm you and you hope that they won't. We have no choice but to trust banks, regardless of whether we feel confident in them.

Don't mistake compulsion for choice. Bank accounts are an essential part of modern life. We have to use them yes, But trust them? Not on your nelly.

I do think the banks should be far more proactive in “screening” potential scam payments and tracking/tracing the scammers - they also should be willing to stop pending payments when the account holder twigs something is dodgy and phones them straightaway. With some of the scams especially for smaller sums it can be understandable someone has been caught out and made a quick BACS payment before realising their mistake. However, the romance scams (even with long term grooming if the victim) are harder to sympathise with. I do find it hard to believe a rational adult (even a gullible one) can genuinely believe some hottie half their age is in love with them - oh, and they have never met in real life! Even if they do believe this as soon as money is mentioned they should be on instant alert. Its not as if these folk are looking for a couple of hundred quid, its tens of thousands being handed over, and the account holder should carry some responsibility for the management /loss of their money. What I see more than anything else in my job is family members syphoning off hundreds and thousands from vulnerable elderly relatives. This is depressingly common, and scams far more money than 92 million per annum. The banks should be doing doing kind of welfare calls to the oldies to see if they understand what they are paying for/to other relatives bills and lifestyles. If its clear they don’t have a scooby should be getting SWD to do a welfare assessment to help protect these folk and GDPR be damned. But thats another thread….

But this is the point. When my DM was in the early stages of dementia and the bank was open I could go in with her. The cashier knew her, (and me), as she went in every week or so for her cash and to pay in a cheque. All the branches in our High St are closed except one. On line it's really difficult, or over the phone with someone in Asia, there's a disconnection, a disassociation, a pressure to do things quickly.
My DS has difficulties - not enough to have no access to his money but the bank does not allow me to keep an eye on him at all. He was scammed for a huge amount of money - and there was no way I had any idea until he came to me suicidal and unable to pay his train fare as his card was declined.