Wonga and ID theft

Surely as it's wonga taking the money, especially if they are taking it from another bank account to the one in which the money was paid into (surely alarm bells should already be ringing as to why someone would get a loan into one account and then pay it off from another) it's their responsibility to ensure that they are taking the money from the correct account?

As they have admitted that the details they had were not the same as those on the account, the postcode was different, if not before then at this point checks should have been carried out, if they did it by bank transfer then they gave the wrong details so Wonga should have at least attempted to confirm the details with your bank, if they have cloned your card then unless they had the actual card then they wouldn't have been in possession of the CVC code. Which ever way it's been done it seems to me as if Wonga havent done their job properly and i'd be seeking compensation from them personally. (you could even charge them %4000 APR on the money they have taken from you without prior authorisation)

It seems as if businesses just like to make it as easy as possible to to comit fraud against them, my old man had 2 t-mobile contracts taken out in his name the phones never arrived, despite having the correct adress, (so someone in the postal/courier service was the likely culprit), but bar adress and surname everything else was wrong, even the spelling of his first name was incorrect, yet t-mobile were happy to allow that contract and sent out 2 brand new expensive phones.

Seems to me that these companies are happy to not do their jobs properly and leave others out of pocket. :mad:

I'm an experiencing something similar by the sounds of it. Barclays Bank fraud department called me yesterday (21st February 2012) due to "unusual activity" on my account. They went through a series of card transactions which were not made/authorised by me. Unfortunately, they authorised one of them to wonga.com for £600. Other payments attempted were to Phones 4 U, Dialaphone (?), Epoch, Tesco, CEWE, O2, Apple Computers and another wonga payment :eek: I confirmed that the payments were not mine. My card was stopped and I was asked to go through my bank statement and call debit card services to report any fraudulent transactions.

I called debit card services yesterday and they said they would be contacting wonga and sending me some sort of form in the post to complete and sign? They also told me to contact wonga to say my card had been used to make payment to them without my authorisation.

I telephoned wonga yesterday and spoke to Lee Adams. She took my details and asked me report the crime to the police and to get a crime reference number. She said my case would be passed on to the fraud team and someone would contact me in due course.

I have logged the crime with the police today and received a crime reference number which I have passed on to wonga.

Clearly, this situation leaves me £600 out of pocket and I am already up to the maximum on my overdraft. I went into my bank today to try and ascertain how they could assist me in the interim - including asking for an extension of my overdraft (having explained that I cannot afford to be £600 out of pocket and I am worried about payments now being declined due to a lack of funds and getting bank charges etc). They said that the bank (Barclays) should be able to refund the £600 back to me and then follow it up with wonga. The bank clerk called debit card services to get this in motion but was told that because wonga is a "financial service" the rules were different and I could not get my money back instantly and it would have to be investigated and it could be up to 45 days until I get any money back

In terms of the overdraft, the bank clerk said there were no "available limits" on my account so I could not be offered a temporary extension of my overdraft and if I did it would be declined and affect my credit rating/score :mad:

Barclays then tried another call to wonga (made from the bank, in my presence - at lunch time today) to try and find out who had been using my debit card as surely my card is linked up to another person that has provided some sort of ID to set up a wonga account in the first place? Wonga says that my card number is not linked to any wonga account. How can that be if they have taken money from my account to pay into a wonga account? I am furious! Surely there must be a link between a payment made and a payment received? They checked my address and there was no record of me at wonga. There was not a search facility for name or for amount and date of transaction :wall:

Wonga are also a nightmare to get through to on the phone - a call centre in Cape Town. We must have tried about five times, pressed option 2, then after holding for a few minutes to be told "thank you for your call - please answer three questions on the service we have provided" when they hadn't even answered the call in the first place! :mad::mad::mad: When we finally got through, we were not able to get any useful information or speak to anyone in the fraud team. I could not get an alternative telephone number for the fraud department or a useful email address. I went through the same information as I did the previous day and was told the same thing: that my details would be passed to the fraud team and they would be in touch.

How this person managed to get my card details in the first place is baffling. I pay for Kaspersky internet security which I was told was a good piece of software - it is up to date. I generally buy most of my goods from reputable sites although I had tried two new websites this month: scribbler (cards) and cardtown (cards). I must admit the cardtown website was a complete shambles in terms of trying to process an order and I wonder if that site was security compromised? I thought it would be a secure site having been recommended for deals on a moneysavingexpert email! :money::huh:

Anyway, I am interested in others experience and what resolve you get. I will keep you posted on my situation.

From one very unhappy bunny :(

You give them 7 days to rectify the situation then issue a notice before action with joint defendants as Wonga and your bank.
If thery Ignore that, it is a money online claim.