My Dad does not believe he is being scammed - what can we do?

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Firstly - my Dad has always been a very honest hard working sort of person - he's in his 80's, in very poor health and he has never behaved like this before.

He became involved with a friend trying to recover a multi million pound sum from South Africa, my dad's involvement started 2 years ago, his friend has been at this for 10 years now, many other people are rumoured to have been involved. We only recently discovered what was happening. We reported the situation to the fraud squad and the local police. The police have visited him and advised him that he was being scammed - they visited his friend too - he's lost a lot of money, money he did not have - he has begged and borrowed from family and the banks. The police can do nothing because they are willingly sending money, people can give money to whoever they like.

We have spoken to all his family - to prevent them from lending him more cash. We are concerned that the bank lent £10k to a very elderly man on a meagre pension, credit union have lent him money too....he has no assets - my mum and him, although still together, have completely separate finances.

So after the shock of discovery and many conversations we had thought he had accepted that he was being scammed. Last night we had a meeting with him to try and figure out a way to repay the money he has borrowed from a relative who has recently been diagnosed with a terminal illness - he refused our help because he still believes the money is coming his way - next week apparently, following another payment by him and his friend.

Things we need to figure out.

Is my mum jointly liable for his debts?

What were the bank thinking lending £10k to a very elderly man with no assists - do they not have some duty of care - is there not a responsible lending code? We intend to have a chat with the bank regarding shutting down his access to credit/overdraft facility, I know we are discussing someone else's account with them but we need to limit the damage.

Dad is clearly not thinking straight - possibly suffering from dementia but he is refusing to get tested - can we do anything about this?

Any ideas on getting my dad to face the reality that there is no money - we have explained about 419 scams, we have pointed out the inconsistencies in the documentation proving the situation is a scam. We have shown him lots of similar scam documentation on the Internet. The police have visited him 3 times...it almost feels like he has been brainwashed, his loyalty to his friend beggars belief, he is acting completely out of character. His friend has lost everything - all his money and his family have gone non contact. But both of them believe that their lives will get back on track any day now, when the money comes in and everyone realises they were right and we will all be sorry.

I am going to see citizens advice this week to find out what we can do if anything.

Brie think the assets trust situation is genuine - I have asked for clarification on who set it up - it happened a long time ago, but it needs to be looked into.

The trust itself may well be genuine but it will not protect the house if the council feel they are entitled to it. There's plenty on Google about it but here's an article from the Telegraph - Telegraph

If they are being charged to administer and maintain the trust, it might be worth reviewing if it's worth it.

Thanks Brie I'll look into it.

His GP will introduce it re POA

We might suggest a POA, but we wouldn't get involved in actually sorting it out - you need to do that, via a solicitor, and can only do it with his full understanding. The suggestion that he might somehow be tricked into it doesn't really work.

This issue was addressed in You and Yours on Radio 4 today. About 15 minutes in.

It's coming to a head again. The money has now apparently been freed to make its way into his friend's account. Dad believes everything should be sorted within 2 weeks. We've been here before - several times! He is now alert enough and sober enough hopefully to deal with the next let down and no doubt the request for money to remove the next stumbling block, at that point we are going to have to try really hard to get him to resolve his financial affairs, which he can still do even while waiting on his windfall.
Thanks for writing good to know what's possible, and clearwater I will listen to You & Yours, thank you!

Not getting advice from the Citizen's Advice felt like a real blow yesterday, I know it doesn't seem like much of a blow but sorting this out is like wading through mud and getting continually pushed down - but I've jumped right back on to it again, thank god for the internet...

Tiggeryoubastard

What about Age Concern for some advice.

Thought I'd do a quick update.

Bank gave him an unsecured loan - what on earth were they thinking, lending an 82 year old with very little income £10k! We are advising him to stop paying it, he'll be blacklisted for credit - which is frankly a good thing!...he will pay back the credit union as my mum is mortified that people in the community will know he can't pay his debts. We will send letters to both institutions to make them aware of the situation.

He has another £5k squirrelled away in a pension policy, he wants to use that to repay his debt to his relative with cancer.
I think POA is not going to happen but we can monitor his bank statements for unusual activity and we definitely need to while he still believes the money will be delivered, this time on 11th Feb.
My poor mother is devastated, we are doing everything we can to ensure they do not feel isolated.
So while we can't convince my dad that he's involved in a scam - we are making good progress in getting him to confront/prioritise his debts, face the people he borrowed from and try to move on.

We are going to try to convince him to have a memory test at the GPs so if he has dementia of some sort (I'm convinced he has), they can give him medication to slow down the effect, might suggest both Mum & Dad have it, so he doesn't feel got at.

As a GP, if you rang me and said you are worried about dementia but your dad won't come in, I'd happily invite him in for something routine like a BP check, you could then come with and raise the memory issue in front of him and it gets things started.

Thanks Writing we have spoken to the GP separately - beginning of January, when Dad visited him for some librium to help him get off the booze, the GP mentioned the memory test but Dad refused it - I think for him it was all too much to take in. He has seen the GP since but I don't think it's been mentioned again. My sister has followed up again last week. The GP also said he'd get the Social services to visit Mum & Dad but I don't think that's happened either...we are following up on that too.
Dad completely forgot that my brother's FIL died - even though he was involved in the discussion as to whether he was fit enough to go to the funeral and this happened when he was completely sober, it didn't just slip his mind - he cannot remember being told.

It's very tricky

The buzzword to use with social services is SOVA - safeguarding of vulnerable adults - if you formally submit a SOVA alert to them (which I think anyone can do) they have to take notice

I really would advise against not paying the bank loan.

Even if it's unsecured there's several ways to get money:

CCJ then
Bankruptcy
Charging order on house
Bailiffs

I think ultimately it would be far more stressful, especially for your mother.

Debt and mental health are taken very seriously by banks.

Please have a look at some websites such as Mind, Step Change and his bank's own website which should have a section for assistance

Thanks Blue of course we will monitor the situation with the bank and intervene if necessary.
Dad doesn't owe enough to go Bankrupt, I think there's a newer alternative for debts less than £30k - it's cheaper than bankruptcy but pretty much does the same thing. We will probably offer a very small monthly payment, that costs more for the bank to administer than they will ever recover. The bank might instruct bailiffs on a vulnerable 83 year old who they probably shouldn't have lent to in the first place, who has been scammed and left penniless...they'd be pretty heartless - but it is a risk I suppose.

My sister emailed the GP to him about the memory test that Dad refused to take in January when he was under an alcoholic fuzz. GP has now said that he wants to make my Dad aware of my sister's email, to ensure my Dad knows what we are doing. I know the GP is just trying to keep himself right but this will not end well. My Dad already thinks my sister is out to get him and despite my Dad being really horrible to her - she has been one of his biggest supporters.

We are trying to protect my Dad from being scammed further but the system is designed so that he is protected from family trying to scam him.

There's a website called Think Jessica - which aims to try to get help for victims of scammers who don't believe they are being scammed and continue to make payouts despite being warned....according to Dad, a massive fortune will arrive in his back account today and all will be well in the world again.

What a horrible situation :(

It's the sunk costs fallacy, isn't it? I've invested so much that I have to keep going, because I can't accept that all the loss has been for nothing. So I sink more into it, and more I invest, the harder it is to turn back.

It's not just about the money either. The sunk costs include his relationships with all of you, and your trust in him. That's another reason to keep going, because when it all comes through, he'll get all those things back.

Except there's no money coming. So the only solution is to keep investing, and so it goes on.

You must be so angry with his friend. But his friend is a victim too.

I really hope that your df is able to realise at some point, that whilst the money is long gone, his relationship with you all isn't yet. If he could just see that the only solution is for him to admit his faults and rebuild the damage he has done.

I really hope he is able to do that.

You sound like a lovely family.

Good luck today, when the money doesn't arrive.

Can you draw him a timeline? Something visual, with all the dates that they said it would come, and all the reasons it didn't, and the amounts then paid again?

Because dangling the carrot a week in the future is tempting, but when you see that all these weeks add up in increments to years, then maybe at the very least he'll be able to see that scam or not, it's never coming.

Thanks Fuck for your kind words.

No surprise, the money did not arrive, they need a further payment to release the chq.

Dad's behaviour yesterday was appalling. He asked my brother for cash to pay his Credit Union debt - we had agreed as a family to pay this debt for Dad, brother offered a chq, Dad not happy, very abusive to my brother - he feels no one trusts him anymore - is threatening to kill himself if he doesn't get the cash....he sounds like a kid who isn't getting his own way, not normal behaviour for him..... this just never bloody ends, thankfully my Mum is blissfully unaware of recent events, I have no idea where she is getting the mental reserves at the moment.

So frustrated that we cannot do anything to stop this, the law is not protecting my Dad from these scammers, the law is not protecting my Dad from himself, instead the law is protecting my Dad from his family, who are desperate to help him but we have our hands tied.

It just sounds awful.

Keep leaning on each other. If this is out of character then you know it's not really him, but it's sometimes important to band together to make sure that no one is taking his reaction personally.

Lots of reassurance all round. He's clearly unable to deal with the level of embarrassment he must be feeling.

I hope you manage to get him some support soon.

And that he can see that stomping his foot and demanding cash, when a cheque is generously offered to help, is ridiculous. It's not the actions of someone thinking straight.

You must feel that his friend took advantage of his not being well.

Make sure you look after yourself.

I'm trying to imagine what I would do if my father was in the same position. There's no easy answer. Just an awful lot of frustration trying to working within the constraints of legal it without a diagnosis for him.

To be honest I think his friend is in exactly the same position - I don't think he is profiting by this any more than Dad. All his children have now gone non-contact...he has lost everything and while he got Dad into it he did so because he couldn't walk away either, they are both convinced the money will come.

My brother is suffering from chest pains - saw GP today - explained the stress he is under and how the other GP at the practice telling my Dad that we have been emailing and requesting help will cause huge waves and not much good will come from it.

His GP was deliberately vague but said that stuff is happening behind the scenes - he implied a multi-agency meeting between social workers, police, GPs to resolve this problem. His GP has assured my brother it will all be over next week - is the GP in on the scam too because that's all we ever hear from my Dad! No idea how they could stop this whole thing by next week...I can't raise my hopes again.

You right fuck he's a proud man - too proud and he's always right about everything. His indignation at his family no longer trusting him financially is hard to take in - the whole thing is hard to take in. Dad has never been particularly interested in money....he's just not himself.

:o at the GP being in on the scam.

That's really good news that things are happening. Fingers crossed there'll be a practical intervention and he won't be able to do any more financial damage at least.

Maybe this will get him the support he needs.