Mortgage application credit check fail because of fraud!

[Christoncrutches]

Shitting nightmare - we've had an offer accepted on a house. Partner's credit score was FLAWLESS but a few months ago O2 got in touch to let him know there was a debt in his name - he'd unwittingly been paying £30 a month to 02 on an account he had no access to. Some feckin arsehole clearly using his identity. 02 have been useless, but did reassure us it would be cleared up and wouldn't affect a credit check when we applied for a mortgage.

He is owed £300 which he's never received, and a record of an unpaid £30 is on record - our mortgage adviser just let us know it's cropped up in the initial check and has asked for an explanation. Obviously we'll have to contact 02 again and ask them to reassure the bank, but we're increasingly concerned it's going to screw up this mortgage application.

We're in an extra rush because the sellers want a fast sale (we got it cheaper because of this - we have no chain) so this is delaying things.

Anyone been in similar situation?

We had this issue when applying for our mortgage. My OH has an unblemished credit history and we found out through a credit history check by our mortgage provider he’d been the victim of ID theft. We were Talk Talk customers several years ago and his name, address and date of birth was part of the Talk Talk data breach a few years ago that was all over the news. Someone in Bolton had used his ID to open a mobile phone account with BT and had managed to rack up a bill amounting to £1200.

It took a lots of calls to BT and the mortgage lender to sort it out. It was a very stressful couple of weeks.My OH is now part of a class action suing Talk Talk for the data breach as it could have cost us our mortgage and his details are still out there and could be used by someone else. Good luck, I’m sure you will get it sorted.

Not related to a mortgage but John Lewis incorrectly marked my credit score and I managed to get them to remove it. It did take a while though, maybe 4-6 weeks? I hope you're able to get it sorted!

@AchillesLastStand

We had this issue when applying for our mortgage. My OH has an unblemished credit history and we found out through a credit history check by our mortgage provider he’d been the victim of ID theft. We were Talk Talk customers several years ago and his name, address and date of birth was part of the Talk Talk data breach a few years ago that was all over the news. Someone in Bolton had used his ID to open a mobile phone account with BT and had managed to rack up a bill amounting to £1200.

It took a lots of calls to BT and the mortgage lender to sort it out. It was a very stressful couple of weeks.My OH is now part of a class action suing Talk Talk for the data breach as it could have cost us our mortgage and his details are still out there and could be used by someone else. Good luck, I’m sure you will get it sorted.

God, how stressful - really hope you get somewhere with the class action! That's exactly what we're concerned about - losing the mortgage at this stage over £30 would be ridiculous! He's less bothered about getting the money back - we won't hold our breath for that judging by their incompetence thus far. He's just hung up on them after another unsuccessful call to try to resolve it - 3 months of waiting for Fraud dept to get in touch (we're trying to get something in writing that we can pass on) and we keep being told 'they will respond in 10 days'.... USELESS.

Really hoping our mortgage advisor will have some useful advice tomorrow, but we're soooo on edge now!

The fact you didn't lose the mortgage gives me hope!

@mobear

Not related to a mortgage but John Lewis incorrectly marked my credit score and I managed to get them to remove it. It did take a while though, maybe 4-6 weeks? I hope you're able to get it sorted!

@mobear - we're worried it'll take that long because we're trying to complete this house sale as fast as possible... might be beyond our control though!

Glad you got it removed eventually!

@Christoncrutches no we didn’t lose the mortgage thankfully but it took a lot of persuading BT and NatWest that it wasn’t our debt. The fact that my OH has never been to Bolton never mind lived there didn’t seem to matter to them. I see you’ve contacted Action Fraud and they’ll give you a case number you can reference but they are useless in resolving these issues unless the fraud in ongoing and is for large sums of money.

I would follow it up with 02 and be very persistent. Ask to speak to their fraud team or someone higher up to get it resolved. They must have an address or some details that are not linked to your partner for this account. I don’t think you will lose the mortgage. This must come up a lot as not everyone has access to their full credit history. We ran free check with Experian before we applied and we both came back as excellent. Then the mortgage lender ran a more detailed credit check with Equifax and up it came. By the way you can access Equifax for free for 30 days. That is what we did to check the debt had been removed. I wish you luck.

I had the same issue with o2 fraud. Tweet them and they will get in touch. It was a nightmare trying to get hold of them so we ended up tweeting the ceos assistant or something I think

You need to contact executive relations Telefonica

[quote AchillesLastStand]@Christoncrutches no we didn’t lose the mortgage thankfully but it took a lot of persuading BT and NatWest that it wasn’t our debt. The fact that my OH has never been to Bolton never mind lived there didn’t seem to matter to them. I see you’ve contacted Action Fraud and they’ll give you a case number you can reference but they are useless in resolving these issues unless the fraud in ongoing and is for large sums of money.

I would follow it up with 02 and be very persistent. Ask to speak to their fraud team or someone higher up to get it resolved. They must have an address or some details that are not linked to your partner for this account. I don’t think you will lose the mortgage. This must come up a lot as not everyone has access to their full credit history. We ran free check with Experian before we applied and we both came back as excellent. Then the mortgage lender ran a more detailed credit check with Equifax and up it came. By the way you can access Equifax for free for 30 days. That is what we did to check the debt had been removed. I wish you luck.[/quote]
@AchillesLastStand it was actually 02 that said it was a fraud, after my OH got in touch after receiving a (fake) debt collection letter from them saying he owed money.
After answering various questions, they realised it was fraudulent. It was then supposed to be passed on to the fraud team, but no-one ever got in touch! 3 months later, here we are paying the price for their incompetence.

I really do hope we don’t lose the mortgage - he’s never had any bad credit, never been in debt, so it seems ridiculous that this could stand in our way.

Tonight we asked to speak to Fraud team and were told it would be another 10 days from tonight’s call - after waiting 3 months for them to call, OH totally lost the plot and ended up hanging up out of frustration.

We’ll see what mortgage advisor recommends tomorrow. Really hope we can get around it.

@PammieDooveOrangeJoof

I had the same issue with o2 fraud. Tweet them and they will get in touch. It was a nightmare trying to get hold of them so we ended up tweeting the ceos assistant or something I think

@PammieDooveOrangeJoof apparently they’ve removed their twitter account - probably because of complaints!

Once you managed to contact someone, was it easily resolved?

@PammieDooveOrangeJoof

You need to contact executive relations Telefonica

Thanks @PammieDooveOrangeJoof will try to follow this up tomorrow - not seeing a direct contact result on google, but maybe more digging will unearth one!

Try @o2 in the uk and copy in ceo mark evans

Yes when I actually spoke to someone in executive relations it was resolved almost immediately and my credit file was updated within two weeks. Can take up to a month for things to show are being removed. Good luck!

@Christoncrutches when my husband did this someone from executive relations contacted him and then called me to discuss further.

Always register with CreditKarma and TotallyMoney.

They alert whenever a hard check is done on your profile. Also, they alert you when a new entry has been made on your account.

Unfortunately even though I am registered with credit karma a hard check wasn’t done and I only knew of the fraud when I received the default letters in the post.
I am v suspicious of the way the fraud was done they were in cahoots with a dhl driver too and not surprised if it was someone who worked at o2 who circumnavigated the credit check somehow.

@PammieDooveOrangeJoof

Try *@o2* in the uk and copy in ceo mark evans

@PammieDooveOrangeJoof Tried this - turns out CEO has changed and the new guy isn't on twitter - GAH! I've been searching for a number for executive relations, but I think they have to call you. We thought we had more luck this morning with customer service number who agreed to at least send an email we could give our mortgage provider - she said she'd send it then call back - waiting 20 mins and nothing. Their customer relations couldn't be worse!

The problem with mobile phone accounts the fraud department at BT told us is that you can open an account with very little information or security checks, a name and date of birth in my OH’s case. We never received any bills because the account was linked to an unknown address in Bolton Lancashire.

We had no idea of the fraud until NatWest did a hard credit check with Equifax and there it was. More ID checks should be done before opening an account such as seeing a driving licence as proof if ID.

OP im sure you will get this resolved very soon if O2 acknowledge that it is fraud. You need to contact the Chief Executive via email, there should be a contact online, or ask them for one and explain you need this urgently resolved because you need a mortgage. Also phone the fraud team everyday to see if it’s been resolved. Good luck.

@AchillesLastStand

The problem with mobile phone accounts the fraud department at BT told us is that you can open an account with very little information or security checks, a name and date of birth in my OH’s case. We never received any bills because the account was linked to an unknown address in Bolton Lancashire.

We had no idea of the fraud until NatWest did a hard credit check with Equifax and there it was. More ID checks should be done before opening an account such as seeing a driving licence as proof if ID.

OP im sure you will get this resolved very soon if O2 acknowledge that it is fraud. You need to contact the Chief Executive via email, there should be a contact online, or ask them for one and explain you need this urgently resolved because you need a mortgage. Also phone the fraud team everyday to see if it’s been resolved. Good luck.

@AchillesLastStand - the CEO has changed recently and we can't find an email for the new one AND there is no contact number for the fraud team to get this resolved - this is the issue... we're contacting customer services multiple times every day and they all say fraud team will call within 10 days then no-one calls. They refuse to give a more direct number or connect us.

@Christoncrutches try this number. I have it in my phone as Fraud O2 so may be a number I eventually squeezed out of them!
01753 564100

Just rang it and the message says welcome to the fraud helpdesk so worth a shot 🤞🏼

[quote PammieDooveOrangeJoof]@Christoncrutches try this number. I have it in my phone as Fraud O2 so may be a number I eventually squeezed out of them!
01753 564100[/quote]
You're a wee star - unfortunately that's the number we started with and according to customer services, they're not dealing with any frauds via that phone number because of COVID! The phone number terminates after you make a selection to deal with the fraud.

It's such a joke - we're tearing out hair out!

Just pm’d you @Christoncrutches

I also emailed this address and someone called me from this team
[email protected]
@Christoncrutches

@PammieDooveOrangeJoof

I also emailed this address and someone called me from this team [email protected] *@Christoncrutches*

@PammieDooveOrangeJoof replied to your DM :)

Trying this email is our next step - we've now got a customer complaints number (allegedly) but they're in 'training' until noon....

Blood pressure is sky high!

@Christoncrutches What is the issue for the mortgage provider?

Is it the missed payment that's showing; or is there a fraud marker from O2?

The former should be able to be resolved, although O2 will need to investigate and then update his credit file, and that can take a month. In that case, he'd be best placed to plead with them to expedite the investigation, and as soon as you reach the stage that they agree that the account was fraudulent, get them to write a headed letter confirming that, which might be enough for the mortgage provider.

If they've already agreed that it's fraud and he has a CIFAS marker, it'll be harder to get that removed - it might then be working with the mortgage provider to find what they need to feel reassured.

This happened to me LOADS a few years ago. It started with O2 accounts, then catalogue accounts, and finally a sub-prime credit card and a British Gas account. 80% got closed okay, although it took an age, one of the catalogue accounts and the credit card have been a nightmare and I'm basically at the point of just having to wait for them to drop off my file. It's horrendous and you have my sympathies!