Help needed – scam payments to "LOVEHOL-DOM" and nowhere left to turn

FreelanceInTheCity

Hi all,
I’m hoping someone here can offer advice or has been through something similar.

Back in March, a relative of mine tried to book flights online through what she believed was Love Holidays. She spoke to someone on the phone, who then moved the conversation to WhatsApp to take payment — something we now know is not normal practice.

Her card wouldn’t go through, so I paid on her behalf using my debit card. Two payments went out — one for £58 (supposedly airport taxes) and one for £87.

We never received a booking confirmation or any kind of follow-up. After a couple of days, we tried calling the number again but there was no response. That’s when I spotted the payments were to LOVEHOL-DOM, not the official Love Holidays. I immediately cancelled my card and called my bank (Lloyds).

Then in April, a further £330.95 was taken by the same merchant. The bank refunded it initially but has now taken it back, saying there’s a recurring billing agreement in place. They also confirmed the same company tried to take £1,600 after that, which thankfully failed.

We’ve spent hours on the phone with Lloyds’ fraud and disputes teams. They advised us to speak to Love Holidays directly, but without a booking reference, we can’t get through their automated system. Action Fraud also won’t investigate.

So now I’m stuck:

• No refund

• No way to contact the actual company

• And apparently no one responsible for investigating this

I’m very careful with money and scams, and this has been a really upsetting experience, both financially and mentally.

Has anyone dealt with a situation like this before?
Is there anywhere else I can go?  A regulator, ombudsman, or someone who can take this further? Or even a way to track down the company behind the “LOVEHOL-DOM” merchant name?

Thank you so much in advance for any advice.

soolin

Quote We’ve spent hours on the phone with Lloyds’ fraud and disputes teams. They advised us to speak to Love Holidays directly, but without a booking reference, we can’t get through their automated system. Action Fraud also won’t investigate.



More knowledgeable people will be along shortly to help but this comment is interesting as it implies Lloyds have misunderstood the situation. Why are Lloyds expecting you to contact Love holidays when this is nothing at all to do with them, have this completely misunderstood the fact that this was a rogue site, not Love Holidays? 

Whilst waiting for others to assist I would suggest that you check your correspondence with Lloyds to ensure you haven’t inadvertently suggested a link between the real and rogue company. Auction fraud are a bit of a red herring, as they can’t do anything anyway and basically just log trending scams. 

soolin

Just to add, I assume you have since done a google search for the rogue company, it’s interesting that just outting their name in a Google search returns an AI response as follows.

"LOVEHOL-DOM" is not a legitimate entity associated with Love Holidays. It's a scam that imitates the legitimate online travel agent, loveholidays. Customers have reported being scammed by this fake merchant, which often uses deceptive tactics like phone calls and WhatsApp to take payments. The real Love Holidays website is loveholidays.com. 

Pollycat

FreelanceInTheCity said:

We’ve spent hours on the phone with Lloyds’ fraud and disputes teams. They advised us to speak to Love Holidays directly, but without a booking reference, we can’t get through their automated system. Action Fraud also won’t investigate.

Soolin makes a great point:

soolin said:

Quote We’ve spent hours on the phone with Lloyds’ fraud and disputes teams. They advised us to speak to Love Holidays directly, but without a booking reference, we can’t get through their automated system. Action Fraud also won’t investigate.

More knowledgeable people will be along shortly to help but this comment is interesting as it implies Lloyds have misunderstood the situation. Why are Lloyds expecting you to contact Love holidays when this is nothing at all to do with them, have this completely misunderstood the fact that this was a rogue site, not Love Holidays? 

Whilst waiting for others to assist I would suggest that you check your correspondence with Lloyds to ensure you haven’t inadvertently suggested a link between the real and rogue company. Auction fraud are a bit of a red herring, as they can’t do anything anyway and basically just log trending scams. 

I'd try Lloyds again, making it very clear that you have no contract with LoveHolidays (so pointless them advising you to contact them) but you have been scammed by a company pretending to be them.

Westin

Agree with the others. I think Lloyds have misunderstood you.  No point you trying to contact the 'real' Love Holidays.

bagand96

soolin said:

Just to add, I assume you have since done a google search for the rogue company, it’s interesting that just outting their name in a Google search returns an AI response as follows.

"LOVEHOL-DOM" is not a legitimate entity associated with Love Holidays. It's a scam that imitates the legitimate online travel agent, loveholidays. Customers have reported being scammed by this fake merchant, which often uses deceptive tactics like phone calls and WhatsApp to take payments. The real Love Holidays website is loveholidays.com. 

It appears the Google AI is scraping this thread to get that information, and doesn't offer any other source so it's solely on this thread.

Whilst it does seem like a scam, are you absolutely certain that LOVEHOL-DOM isn't a LoveHolidays account? (transaction merchant names are sometimes odd).  There must be a way to contact LH and bypass the automated process to just confirm there isn't any booking with your relative's details.  Even if just to give more evidence to your bank. 

From their website How do I contact you? - loveholidays FAQs they list a phone number of 01234 975 975 for customer care and 0208 175 1132 for new bookings.

Pollycat

bagand96 said:

soolin said:

Just to add, I assume you have since done a google search for the rogue company, it’s interesting that just outting their name in a Google search returns an AI response as follows.

"LOVEHOL-DOM" is not a legitimate entity associated with Love Holidays. It's a scam that imitates the legitimate online travel agent, loveholidays. Customers have reported being scammed by this fake merchant, which often uses deceptive tactics like phone calls and WhatsApp to take payments. The real Love Holidays website is loveholidays.com. 

It appears the Google AI is scraping this thread to get that information, and doesn't offer any other source so it's solely on this thread.

Whilst it does seem like a scam, are you absolutely certain that LOVEHOL-DOM isn't a LoveHolidays account? (transaction merchant names are sometimes odd).  There must be a way to contact LH and bypass the automated process to just confirm there isn't any booking with your relative's details.  Even if just to give more evidence to your bank. 

From their website How do I contact you? - loveholidays FAQs they list a phone number of 01234 975 975 for customer care and 0208 175 1132 for new bookings.

I think the OP would have received a booking reference if the payment was legitimate.

Added to the fact that the OP said "she spoke to someone on the phone, who then moved the conversation to WhatsApp to take payment — something we now know is not normal practice" is probably enough to accept it's a scam.
Plus the fact that they got no response from the number they originally called to book.

I wonder where the OP's relative found the number originally...
Facebook perhaps...

bagand96

Pollycat said:

I think the OP would have received a booking reference if the payment was legitimate.

Added to the fact that the OP said "she spoke to someone on the phone, who then moved the conversation to WhatsApp to take payment — something we now know is not normal practice" is probably enough to accept it's a scam.
Plus the fact that they got no response from the number they originally called to book.

I wonder where the OP's relative found the number originally...
Facebook perhaps...

I agree that unfortunately everything here does point to a scam.  But given the bank is either misunderstanding the OP or being particularly unhelpful there might be no harm in getting confirmation that there's no booking with the real LH.  It should only take them a matter of minutes to ascertain whether they hold a booking for a particular passenger name and departure date.  

OP your next step is to raise a complaint with Lloyds.  If you still get an unsatisfactory response you could consider a complaint to the Financial Ombudsman.  

FreelanceInTheCity

Thank you for all your comments. This is my first ever forum post. Appreciate all responses, which I need go through in more detail…
Re. Lloyds, there was confusion their end and the person facilitating the last call invited us to complain - one thing at a time. This one is stressful enough!
Re. Initial call to book flights - the relative in question called Bournemouth Int airport as that is where she planned to travel from. Not how I would have gone about it. 

Pollycat

FreelanceInTheCity said:

Thank you for all your comments. This is my first ever forum post. Appreciate all responses, which I need go through in more detail…
Re. Lloyds, there was confusion their end and the person facilitating the last call invited us to complain - one thing at a time. This one is stressful enough!
Re. Initial call to book flights - the relative in question called Bournemouth Int airport as that is where she planned to travel from. Not how I would have gone about it. 

I think your most important thing is to get back to Lloyds and tell them you've been scammed.

The bit in bold is very odd.
You first said she tried to book flights online.
Then she ended up talking to what she believed was LoveHolidays.
So how did she get the number for this fake LoveHolidays?
What advice did Bournemouth Airport give her?