Remitly taking money from my bank fraudulently

[PuffballFrizzball]

And apparently there's nothing I can do about it until the payments clear and then I have to dispute them and wait to get the money back?

I don't have a Remitly account, I've never even heard of it before today, but I woke up this morning to find 3 payments totalling nearly £500 pending from my bank account to Remitly.

My email accounts both have 2FA switched on as does my online banking. No emails, no notifications, nothing. I don't have a Remitly account in my name or linked to my email or phone number.

Obviously I immediately rang my bank who said I can't stop the money going out, I have to wait for the payments to clear them dispute them?! And to freeze my card in the meantime. So now I'm skint because I don't have £500 spare, my money is all pending to these transactions.

So I rang Remitly who are "looking into it" but couldn't tell me anything and could only confirm that there's no account linked to my name, email, or phone number. Got to wait 48 hours for a reply from their fraud team. They can't cancel them until they find the payments at their end but as I don't have any of the details (because I didn't make them!) that will take time.

What I don't get is when I use my card online, at least half the time I have to authorise the transaction in my internet banking even when it's ordering stuff to my address in my name! So how can someone set up an international money transfer in someone else's name with someone else email address without the bank picking up on it as potential fraud???

You can report this as fraud now to your bank so set they up now - ask for the fraud team and insist on speaking to them

I have rung them and spoken to the fraud team, who insisted that until the money actually leaves my account there is nothing they can do? At the moment the payments are all "pending" and apparently there is no way to cancel them without a code from Remitly, which Remitly won't give me until they've investigated at their end?

Weirdly I’ve just had the same conversation with my Zopa credit card. Two transactions this morning not made by me to the same business that are pending and they can’t cancel them until they’ve cleared. I have to phone them back to dispute them although they have cancelled my card etc meantime.
Bonkers

Well I've finally worked out how to report via the app, seeing as the fraud people on the phone were useless and wouldn't let me report it as a fraud until the payments cleared.

Unfortunately the app chat staff are just as useless, they keep asking irrelevant questions like "do you remember making these payments" (obviously fucking not, or I wouldn't be reporting them as fraudulent would I?) and "can anyone else access your phone with a fingerprint" even though I've explained three times that it's a card payment (probably card cloning) so my phone doesn't even come into the equation! And they take about an hour to read and reply to each message, so after most of the day on live chat we haven't yet got very far at all.

So frustrating! I don't get why they can't cancel a pending payment. It's so obviously fraudulent in my case.

Very similar situation. Money came out of my bank account on 3 different days in total over £600. Happen this week. All I could see on my statement is Remitly. Never had account with them, didn’t know they even existed until today.
Did get in contact with them. Told them amount of money, last for digits of my bank account but they couldn’t find anything.
Contacted bank, cancelled my debit card and raised a fraud claim.
My guess someone crated account with my card details. Wonder who and how got my debit card details.

This is why I use virtual cards when spending - what bank are you with OP they sound absolutely dreadful!

UPDATE

Went to the bank, got refund for all 3 transactions. Cancelled my bank card and ordered new one. Bank will ask money back from Remitly. Guy at the bank said that Money got send from my account to someone in Portugal. Bank had guys name (obviously first time heard his name). All good as long as bank will prove it’s a fraud.

Not sure how to use this Forum. Only joined it as I found someone with exactly same situation as me.