Money not refunded by bank after I was mugged

DullGreyGuy

jon81uk said:
In regards to the OPs situation its not clear if the bank is liable to give the money back, I thought this would be more of a police matter to recover stolen funds?

Generally the police's role is to prevent crime, keep the peace and pursue those that break the law.

If someone decides to smash your window for a laugh the police will charge them with criminal damage, the CPS will decide about prosecution and there are a few compensation schemes/charities may help financially in certain circumstances. None of those official bodies however are there to get them to pay you the £200 for a new window. For that you either look to your insurance or you attempt to sue the transgressor 

Now if the police happen to find your stolen goods etc they'll return them but if they catch the person that stole your phone and they don't have it on their person/in their home they aren't going to have a 20 man task force dedicated to looking for it. 

Banks, thanks to their data sharing and organisations like CIFAS, do most the investigation in things like fraud cases as they have all the tools/skills needed and then present the evidence to the police for a decision on charging etc. I'd guess it would be similar when it's linked to a physical crime but maybe a bit more collaboration rather than the police being hands off until the banks have done their work. 

Exodi

EDITED: it seems the mods have taken action, my comments below were made before but I've edited out the comments as I don't want to promote them.

I think some of the response to the OP have been totally disgusting to be completely honest.

danny13579 said:

SoftCell68 said:

Thanks for some of the comments on here but some others seem to be from the victim blaming camp which is not only inappropriate, it is wrong.

<removed>

danny13579 said:

SoftCell68 said:

Please refrain from posting here because you 're just a keyboard warrior with no compassion.

<removed>

Absolutely crazy to respond to someone like this having just been robbed at knife-point.

The witch-hunt on whether the OP has the same PIN for his banking app as his phone is completely irrelevant, given that even if he did, the attackers were accessing his account on his phone with him there (it even sounds like they did a transfer with him present). It's just more pointless nonsense like "Were you openly flaunting your watch and phone" to imply it's somehow the victims fault for being robbed. I personally hope the mods pull up some of the worst offenders in this thread. What a sad introduction to this forum.

For those discussing removing the apps from the phone, alternatively you can just hide the apps (e.g. via Secure Folder or by putting them in obscure folders (e.g. the third page of 'Food' apps, for example)) but this is all captain hindsight stuff, the majority of people would be susceptible to the attack, just like the OP was. I certainly would be.

Please provide us an update of the banks decision as I think it would useful to others whether the banks takes responsibility for the theft given the circumstances. And please ignore the less than friendly posters, most of us aren't like that.

I can't imagine how terrified you must have been at the time, especially having sustained a serious eye injury. My worst nightmare, it's making my hair raise just thinking about it.

miller

Sorry that the OP had to go through this. 

On the Co-Op switching thread someone had a fraud block placed on their account (they had to telephone to get it removed) for attempting to transfer 1p to an account in their own name. I find it astonishing that the police knew the destination account(s) were fraudulent, but the bank didn't.

DullGreyGuy

Exodi said:

EDITED: it seems the mods have taken action, my comments below were made before but I've edited out the comments as I don't want to promote them.

I think some of the response to the OP have been totally disgusting to be completely honest.

danny13579 said:

SoftCell68 said:

Thanks for some of the comments on here but some others seem to be from the victim blaming camp which is not only inappropriate, it is wrong.

<removed>

danny13579 said:

SoftCell68 said:

Please refrain from posting here because you 're just a keyboard warrior with no compassion.

<removed>

Absolutely crazy to respond to someone like this having just been robbed at knife-point.

The witch-hunt on whether the OP has the same PIN for his banking app as his phone is completely irrelevant, given that even if he did, the attackers were accessing his account on his phone with him there (it even sounds like they did a transfer with him present). It's just more pointless nonsense like "Were you openly flaunting your watch and phone" to imply it's somehow the victims fault for being robbed. I personally hope the mods pull up some of the worst offenders in this thread. What a sad introduction to this forum.

For those discussing removing the apps from the phone, alternatively you can just hide the apps (e.g. via Secure Folder or by putting them in obscure folders (e.g. the third page of 'Food' apps, for example)) but this is all captain hindsight stuff, the majority of people would be susceptible to the attack, just like the OP was. I certainly would be.

Please provide us an update of the banks decision as I think it would useful to others whether the banks takes responsibility for the theft given the circumstances. And please ignore the less than friendly posters, most of us aren't like that. I hope bans are issued.

I can't imagine how terrified you must have been at the time, especially having sustained a serious eye injury. My worst nightmare, it's making my hair raise just thinking about it.

I think we have very different views of what a witch hunt looks like @exodi

No one is blaming the victim that I can see on here nor is anyone saying that they wouldn't have surrendered both phone and PIN(s). What threads on MSE however are often about is not simply to help the person thats asked the question but to also consider future people that read this and how they can potentially avoid or mitigate their losses if they are ever unfortunate enough to be in the same position. Understanding how things happened helps both with dealing with the complaint (for the OP) and advising others on how to avoid/mitigate their losses. 

You'll often see threads that say "you should have", that will never help the person that already hasn't but will help the next person that reads it before they have. 

As has been mentioned, there are various tools phone software has that can help if your phone is stollen from you, not everyone will know about them, know how to use them, or know that you need to activate them before you lose your phone. Won't help the OP but will help others; one person has already said this thread has made them delete a banking app to reduce their risk because they never use it on their phone so it has reduced their risk of potential losses. 

Its best practice of different password/PINs is widespread and potentially could be used as an argument as to being careless in the loss depending on exactly what happened. That isn't victim blaming but thinking practically about the complaints process and the fact banks aren't liable if it can be shown the customer hasn't sufficient careful with their card/PIN/Access etc. 

jon81uk

DullGreyGuy said:

jon81uk said:
In regards to the OPs situation its not clear if the bank is liable to give the money back, I thought this would be more of a police matter to recover stolen funds?

Generally the police's role is to prevent crime, keep the peace and pursue those that break the law.

If someone decides to smash your window for a laugh the police will charge them with criminal damage, the CPS will decide about prosecution and there are a few compensation schemes/charities may help financially in certain circumstances. None of those official bodies however are there to get them to pay you the £200 for a new window. For that you either look to your insurance or you attempt to sue the transgressor 

Now if the police happen to find your stolen goods etc they'll return them but if they catch the person that stole your phone and they don't have it on their person/in their home they aren't going to have a 20 man task force dedicated to looking for it. 

Banks, thanks to their data sharing and organisations like CIFAS, do most the investigation in things like fraud cases as they have all the tools/skills needed and then present the evidence to the police for a decision on charging etc. I'd guess it would be similar when it's linked to a physical crime but maybe a bit more collaboration rather than the police being hands off until the banks have done their work. 

Yep given how little the police do seem to put into stolen goods and robbery now I'm not sure why would do much more, but this is closer to theft than fraud, so I don't think it is on the bank to get the money back alone, it would be partly up to the police too.

Exodi

DullGreyGuy said:

Exodi said:

EDITED: it seems the mods have taken action, my comments below were made before but I've edited out the comments as I don't want to promote them.

I think some of the response to the OP have been totally disgusting to be completely honest.

danny13579 said:

SoftCell68 said:

Thanks for some of the comments on here but some others seem to be from the victim blaming camp which is not only inappropriate, it is wrong.

<removed>

danny13579 said:

SoftCell68 said:

Please refrain from posting here because you 're just a keyboard warrior with no compassion.

<removed>

Absolutely crazy to respond to someone like this having just been robbed at knife-point.

The witch-hunt on whether the OP has the same PIN for his banking app as his phone is completely irrelevant, given that even if he did, the attackers were accessing his account on his phone with him there (it even sounds like they did a transfer with him present). It's just more pointless nonsense like "Were you openly flaunting your watch and phone" to imply it's somehow the victims fault for being robbed. I personally hope the mods pull up some of the worst offenders in this thread. What a sad introduction to this forum.

For those discussing removing the apps from the phone, alternatively you can just hide the apps (e.g. via Secure Folder or by putting them in obscure folders (e.g. the third page of 'Food' apps, for example)) but this is all captain hindsight stuff, the majority of people would be susceptible to the attack, just like the OP was. I certainly would be.

Please provide us an update of the banks decision as I think it would useful to others whether the banks takes responsibility for the theft given the circumstances. And please ignore the less than friendly posters, most of us aren't like that. I hope bans are issued.

I can't imagine how terrified you must have been at the time, especially having sustained a serious eye injury. My worst nightmare, it's making my hair raise just thinking about it.

I think we have very different views of what a witch hunt looks like @exodi

No one is blaming the victim that I can see on here

At least 6 comments have been removed from this thread by mods. There have been clear examples of victim-blaming which I won't repeat for obvious reasons.

Agree with the other stuff you say about discussion to help potential future victims (assuming it is done compassionately to the OP...)

DullGreyGuy said:

Its best practice of different password/PINs is widespread and potentially could be used as an argument as to being careless in the loss depending on exactly what happened. That isn't victim blaming but thinking practically about the complaints process and the fact banks aren't liable if it can be shown the customer hasn't sufficient careful with their card/PIN/Access etc. 

Will disagree on this again as the muggers accessed his banking app with him there. Whether he used the same PIN or not (which is only speculation and to be honest, I'm not completely clear why it was even brought up in the first place) is again irrelevant, because the muggers would have just asked him for his bank app PIN in the latter case. They did a transfer in his presence. No OTP, secret question, 12+ digit passcode with special characters, etc would have prevented it.

I doubt the bank would use this as an argument as the muggers would have gotten in either case. I sincerely doubt they'd even ask this detail, yet some in this thread seem obsessed by it.

GeoffTF

I searched for "how often do muggers demand phone pins uk", and found a lot of reports of similar incidents. If you have a banking app on your phone, it is wise to limit the amount of money in the account. Obviously, the app should have a separate PIN. Keeping the phone hidden away may help too. I saw a suggestion that you should throw the phone on the ground and smash it if you are mugged, but no accounts of anyone trying it.

oldernonethewiser

DullGreyGuy said:

oldernonethewiser said:

AmityNeon said:

sausage_time said:

All this talk of not taking phones out and about with banking and finance apps is certainly something to think about.  But smartphones have web browsers too - and in many cases the passwords may be stored there. 

Smartphones also have app stores and a history of purchases/downloads. It’s about creating layers of obfuscation so adversaries are faced with additional hurdles.

Storing passwords in a web browser is terrible security practice, although this raises a point regarding password managers on smartphones. Avoid having the app installed if possible, but if not, make sure it’s secured with something other than the default phone passcode.

The password manager I use cannot be opened with anything as simple as a passcode. 

Wouldn't it be more helpful to name the password manager?

Zanderman said:

sausage_time said:

All this talk of not taking phones out and about with banking and finance apps is certainly something to think about.  But smartphones have web browsers too - and in many cases the passwords may be stored there. 

And it would be really bad practice to allow your browser - on your phone - to save banking passwords wouldn't it? (I never allow my browser to save any passwords, on any device)

Which bank gives access to its website by a simple password? Most, from my experience, want at least 2 codes and often at least 1 will be 3rd letter type stuff and most web browsers cannot store two and can't deal with random character entry. 

This at least is where Apple's new security feature would help as if the phone is in a non-normal place for you then you can only access stored passwords (in Safari) using biometrics and not pin/password

The OP remains light on certain detail but I am struggling to imagine them being held onto the ground whilst they are using his phone to physically do the bank transfers... I'm guessing the transfers were to overseas accounts otherwise far too easy for the police to trace and that would be a lot of codes for them to remember whilst dealing with their victim at the same time and working out how you do international transfers in whichever random bank the victim happens to use. 

Not really.  I was merely commenting on the access to mine.  I don't know how others work but plenty of information online.

miller

GeoffTF said:

I searched for "how often do muggers demand phone pins uk", and found a lot of reports of similar incidents. If you have a banking app on your phone, it is wise to limit the amount of money in the account. Obviously, the app should have a separate PIN. Keeping the phone hidden away may help too. I saw a suggestion that you should throw the phone on the ground and smash it if you are mugged, but no accounts of anyone trying it.

You're probably going to lose it anyway, so it's certainly an option (better hope it's inoperable after that). Whether that inflames the situation or not, who knows.

Rawrzy

I started moving most of my banking apps into a secure folder last year after worrying about this kind of thing. Unfortunately not all apps work. I noticed Barclays just errors when you try and use the app in the secure folder. Not helpful at all.