Investment Bonds paying 3.924% or 5.4%

AnotherJoe

Solar_House wrote: »

I agree that most of the material used by the BT scammers might have been stolen or imitated, but what about the involvement of a serious bank like NW bank in allowing the scammers to open a Merian Global Investors Client account? This was a NatWest branch at Level 7, Aldgate Union, 10 Whitechapel High Street, London E1 8DX with a sorting code of 623170 (which turned out to be accurate.)
When ever an individual or company open an account with a bank, they usually put you through the mill, asking endless documentation and ID. So why not those scammers? Hence my belief that the scammers might be working under the umbrella of Merian Global Investors as rogue employees or ex-employees. Otherwise, they might have encountered problems opening the account.

There are many valid ways it may have been opened, and some invalid ways such as fake ID and fake documents. It's worth following up in case it was an invalid way and you can then make a claim against the bank.
It would be interesting to know under what name it was opened, you've assumed it was as Merian Global Investors, but it may well have been Mr Smith.

GDB2222

Solar_House wrote: »

I agree that most of the material used by the BT scammers might have been stolen or imitated, but what about the involvement of a serious bank like NW bank in allowing the scammers to open a Merian Global Investors Client account? This was a NatWest branch at Level 7, Aldgate Union, 10 Whitechapel High Street, London E1 8DX with a sorting code of 623170 (which turned out to be accurate.)
When ever an individual or company open an account with a bank, they usually put you through the mill, asking endless documentation and ID. So why not those scammers? Hence my belief that the scammers might be working under the umbrella of Merian Global Investors as rogue employees or ex-employees. Otherwise, they might have encountered problems opening the account.

Was the account definitely in the name of Merian? It's possible it was set up in the name of A N Other, but they gave you the account number and told you it was in the name of Merian.

Malthusian

Solar_House wrote: »

Hence my belief that the scammers might be working under the umbrella of Merian Global Investors as rogue employees or ex-employees.

The exact same scam (with identical wordings used) is being or has been run under the stolen names of Bridgepoint, Standard Life, Charterhouse, TPG, Blackstone and A&M Lewis Investments. Is it a cabal of rogue employees from all of them?

You seem to have this idea that the scam must somehow involve the real Merian Global Investors because then you don't have to beat yourself up about almost falling for it (bar a banking error). It doesn't but you don't have to beat yourself up anyway.

Lokolo

Solar_House wrote: »

I agree that most of the material used by the BT scammers might have been stolen or imitated, but what about the involvement of a serious bank like NW bank in allowing the scammers to open a Merian Global Investors Client account? This was a NatWest branch at Level 7, Aldgate Union, 10 Whitechapel High Street, London E1 8DX with a sorting code of 623170 (which turned out to be accurate.)
When ever an individual or company open an account with a bank, they usually put you through the mill, asking endless documentation and ID. So why not those scammers? Hence my belief that the scammers might be working under the umbrella of Merian Global Investors as rogue employees or ex-employees. Otherwise, they might have encountered problems opening the account.

As you should well know, banks do not check names on transfers. Therefore the account is very unlikely to have the name Merian anywhere near it. But of course, any transfers won't check that.

Having the same sort code as a company also means absolutely nothing. Thousands of accounts are likely to have that same sort code.

Merian are investigating, and as you can see the post by MSE, they are taking it very seriously.

alejandroX

Hi everyone,
I think AM Lewis clone is still active: capitalsecurebonds dot com
Some other fishy offers - fixedreturninvestment dot com and intelligentreturns dot org
:cool: