To think they did this on purpose? PIL related

[Dannilion]

Bit of background..

PIL's are shit with money. They have had failed business after failed business, declared themselves bankrupt, borrowed £££££'s from friends as investments, asked DH to launder money for them etc.

FIL is nice enough, just made some very silly decisions as well as being on the receiving end of some very bad luck. MIL are very different but get on on a surface level.

Anyways, a few months ago PIL's came round and asked if they could open a bank account in DH's name in order to receive their wages or something as due to their bankruptcy they were struggling with doing so. DH said no, as it was obviously illegal and he is also self employed and didn't want to be investigated. Also PFB was due and we were worried about the effect it would have on us when it came to claiming tax credits etc. Not that we should have had to have given a reason for not wanting to partake in this, but we had plenty.

Fast forward to them coming to visit the baby last week and bringing some letters for him that had arrived at their address. He gets the odd one every so often. He opens one and it's from Santander, thanking him for opening a new account. He never opened a new account with them, ever.

PIL's were very quick to say 'oh your father opened an account with them but they did it in the wrong name by accident, never mind all sorted now etc' and changed the subject.

I just can't see how a bank could open an account in the wrong name for someone who hasn't lived at that address in years. All his other mail comes here so if there is some sort of grand database it would had him at our home address surely?

I haven't broached this with DH yet as it would be devastating for him. But AIBU to think that they have probably gone ahead and opened a bank account in his name? Obviously if they have we will have to deal with it ASAP.

I would really follow K8Middleton's advice OP. When my sister stole my identity, I couldn't get the police to do anything. The fraud was committed by my sister against the company with whom she borrowed money from. Therefore I should imagine that it would be the same in this case, and the PIL have defrauded Santander...not DH. Phone the fraud number and get them on to it. You may well want the satisfaction of a confrontation, but this way the professionals carry out the investigation while you piece your life back together without additional stress.

I am just so sorry for you.

I feel your pain - or more your DHs, l have watched my DH for years now - an intelligent, very savvy man, soak up the most outrageous crocks of shit from his son about car insurance letters, road tax final reminders, speeding tickets, bailiffs,debt collector mail coming to our address. He always has an excuse or unbelievable series of events up his sleeve to explain this.
His son, very obviously to me and the rest of the world with at least one brain cell is using our address for purposes of shaking off debts, traffic penalties and to keep his car insurance costs down (we live in an area of much lower insurance costs than him). He hasn't lived here for two years.
I guess it's just very hard to believe someone you love is blatantly dishonest most of all to yourself, maybe it's just too hurtful.

OP - suggest to your DH it's better to call up those fraud helplines during the working day rather than the evenings, because most people wait until they are back from work at home to call, can he call today during normal working hours, (avoiding lunchtime) because he'll be kept on hold a lot less and is more likely to get the ball rolling today than going into branch this afternoon/tomorrow.

As others have said, it could well be hte 'girl' in Santandar is in on it too, or if MIL goes postal, she'll be onthe back foot and will apologise for her 'mistake' in face of an angry customer, which when investigated will turn out not to be a mistake at all...

I have seen other posters on here whose husbands have happily colluded in their parents' fraudulent behaviours to the detriment of their several disabled children. It is a horrible psychological blind spot.

You and your DH are likely to have a v hard time but I agree you should focus on facts right now.

*Your dh needs to phone Santander and ask about it. And then immediately close the account. You can put the money somewhere safe and quietly wait for the PILs to ask about it. At which point they better have a good explanation!

DO this^^ What Berthabog said*

Just seen this advise repeated and have to say, in my opinion it's really bad advice. You can't have it both ways, either your dh knows nothing about the account, had nothing to do with opening it, the account is fraudulent and he wants nothing to do with it, or he wants the money from the account in which case it must be his account and he must have opened it anything else would be stealing!

OP - please can I just also say that you and DH have a legal obligation to report suspicious activities. If your PIL are at any point investigated and it comes out that they asked your DH for these favours, he would be seen as complicit and could face a jail sentence.

I work in the financial industry and it is drilled into us on a half yearly basis how important it is to report ANYTHING we think may be related to fraud or money laundering.

Even if you decided that PIL were legit, if it turns out they are not and an investigation decides that it would have been reasonable for you to have suspicions, you could be in trouble.

It's a really shit thing your PIL have done.

Hello everyone, sorry for disappearing. Had a bad night of a growth spurting refluxy velcro baby and there just aren't enough matchsticks to prop my eyes open.

Will do that noddle thing ASAP.

DH is at work today and unfortunately works in a trade that would be very dangerous to use your phone in, but I'll try and persuade him to take a break and call the fraud team. And before anyone says 'how can he be at work whilst this is going on', he's self employed and we're skint. He needs to work. He didn't even take any paternity leave after I had an EMCS!

I can totally appreciate that they would be the best people to talk to, but a large part of his world has come crashing down around him and it's difficult to be both assertive and considerate of his emotions. Would they take a report from me or would it have to be DH?

blu and k8Middleton have given excellent advice. I agree with the idea that you focus on finding out the facts rather than thinking about what scumbags the InLaws appear to be.

You've been offered some good advice here and I appreciate that you need to be sensitive to your OH's feelings I think you absolutely must get this started today. If you don't you may begin to look like accomplices.

You could phone and ask? The fraud number isn't premium rate (I don't think).
Good luck.

BTW. I completely understand if you can't deal with this the 'best' way, it's not always possible when there is so much emotional stuff involved.

Well I appreciate it's a shock for him, but he needs to protect himself, you & his baby!

They asked him to launder money-so it's not exactly implausible that they might have done this-nor has it come from nowhere!

For me the laundering money request would have been a reason to cut contact!

They only care about themselves!

Sorry I just realised my last seemed really arsey. It wasn't meant to be, I really am grateful for all the advice. I'd probably still be staring at the wall sweating under my breath if it wasn't for mumsnet

Swearing! Although it is quite hot today..

It didn't sound off at all, Danillion. I can only guess the stress you must be under right now so if you want to offload a little bit here, you just go straight ahead.

I would ring up the fraud department on your dh's behalf now, especially if your dh is in a job where it is very difficult to get to the phone, let alone for a call that you could be on hold waiting for a very long time and you would like to make it in reasonable privacy, where you can think, make notes and not be rushed and stressed about making a call from work when you shouldn't be.

Tell them that you tried to call last night but that you were on hold for half an hour and couldn't wait any longer, especially on a premium number (If they tell you that it's not, then that's great, but from what you've posted here, you obviously thought that the number you were calling was - hopefully you'll be able to use the local number somebody else put on the thread for you so that won't be as expensive).

If you explain the situation - that you only found out last night, you spoke to PIL who explained they thought it had been opened up in mistake and cancelled, then looked up on what to do so tried to call but had to give up after half an hour to go to bed/too expensive/baby screaming etc.

Which brings you to today - you are phoning on behalf of your dh as he is at work without access to a phone, you are ringing to get the ball rolling. You appreciate that they will need to speak to him, but you want to find out if you can open a case file, get a flag put onto the account asap in case anybody tries anything with it, and to find out if they can ring you back this evening (or whenever, I assume if dh is working today and you have young dc then he will be home this evening) or to find out when a good time to call out of working hours is, and typically how long they expect somebody to hold on whilst on hold to speak to them. Also find out from them whether or not you should be reporting it to the police and what your next steps should be.

Then that will show that you are making an effort, trying to get into contact with them asap despite difficulties of work and babies. Plus hopefully it will make it easier to contact someone or be contacted by someone this evening for your dh. And you will know if you need to go to the police or not, go into the bank or not and so on.

With regard to your PIL and MIL's offer to point out the girl in the bank, I'd just say that you were able to speak to someone on the phone about it, and that now the bank obviously want the fraud team on it (omitting to mention that it was the fraud team you rang directly ) so that for the moment they don't want her to point out the girl at the bank, but that obviously they will want to speak to her and as part of that they may well want her to point out the girl at the bank at a later stage in their investigations, depending on what they find... If it was all a massive coincidence and cock up then no problem, they can improve their procedures to stop it happening again, that's a legitimate thing for the fraud squad to be investigating because it could happen again and next time it might turn into a fraud situation.

Then that gets you & dh off the hook from going to the bank with MIL, and hopefully scare your mil if she has done anything dodgy to make her think twice about doing anything like it again, whereas if she hasn't done anything and it was a genuine accident then she doesn't need to worry as they'll be investigating where their procedures let them down.

Good luck - sounds like lots of stress at a time when you really don't need it!

Agree with zipzap, KMiddleton, great advice there. Try to get the ball rolling, I have done it when DHs wallet was stolen, he wasn't in a position to get his cards cancelled there and then, so I called all the issuers. All cancelled on my say so, some were joint accounts, bar one who put the card on hold for 24 hours to allow DH to call and confirm later.

I wouldn't mention the fraud team to MIL, you could say that you wanted to be sure the account was closed so contacted the 'accounts closing team'.

It stops any comeback from your PIL at the moment and MIL doing the hysterical distraction thing as it looks as though you are going along with their story. It gives you and your DH some breathing time whilst Santander investigate. It may not scare your PIL not to try anything again, but by the sound of it they keep trying anyway and you might need something stronger in the future depending on what the bank say.

OMG, this is just awful. I cannot see how it can be anything other than his PIL lying. I hope your DH can cope when the truth comes out.

Yes give them a ring. They won't discuss the account with you but you can give them the information. And yes I meant to say it you just deal with it as if you knew nothing about the pils (except telling the bank - do tell them everything) you can avoid all the unpleasantness for a little while to give dh some breathing space.

It's not unusual for people to be unable to come to terms with people they trust defrauding them - so keeping it separate can help. In the past I've had to sign big cheques where I strongly suspected the account holder of being bullied or coerced and so I have talked to the account holder alone to make sure they understand exactly what is happening. Even when it is blindingly obvious people can still be in denial. It's heartbreaking.

It is possible it's a mistake if a series of unlikely coincidences occurred: previous account at Abbey, Alliance & Leicester or Bradford & Bingley causing dh to be on the database; enough credit history at old address for credit score to go through (possible if pil are bringing round letters for dh); bank employee picking the wrong customer and not spotting the wrong name and DOB; the system crashing when trying to cancel account... and nobody noticing... but it would be extremely unlikely. It would also take about 5 mins for fraud to tell because for a current account you need lots of info in addition to standard 'know your customer' details (name, DOB, nationality, occupation, account funding). If that's all dh's info then on the balance of probabilities it's no accident. Particularly because fil's financial situation would make getting any account other than a basic very, very difficult and it would be unlikely to be approved on the spot.

So, proceed as if it is possibly a mistake for now and deal with pils when and if you need to later. Hopefully that will make things a tiny bit easier.

I don't think the lady from Santander is involved.
It is very easy to steal someone's identity, once you have their personal details - and these are his parents who, not only know him thoroughly but also receive his mail, too.

It's unlikely but not impossible. Pils much more likely IMO :(

But best to wait and see before doing anything other than speaking to bank.

i would advise not telling your pil's anything else from this moment on. you cant trust them... and to be honest, involved or not, they do not need any further information or updates wrt this. even if they come to you (which screams guilty imo) wanting to discuss it or needing updates, just say its being dealt with and leave it at that.

good luck

Said it before and wil say it again I cannot stress enough that this is sorted ASAP. It's not only a potential fraud case but it involves people who are bankrupt which makes it ten times worse. If your husband is even thought to be involved in some way there will be the biggest heap of shit on your heads ever. Not trying to scare you just telling you facts. It cannot be left too long you need to listen to what others are telling you and get on with credit checks etc. including the new baby's name.

Hope your DH manages to get some concentrated work time today to clear his head. If he can't ring banks, hopefully his parents can't ring him to badger him either...

How awful for you both, it's a heart rending situation for dh in to in. I can't imagine how awful it must be to need to call the police for something his mum and dad have done.

By the way equifax do a free month trial which checks out your credit rating and any accounts it debts you may have.

You need to give them credit card details but as long as you cancel within the time it's free and instant.

Another vote for not telling DH's parents anything. Also keep your financial paperwork away from them when they visit. Any bills with your address on can be used to open accounts in your name, if they register for internet banking you won't know what is going on as you won't receive any letters.