DRN-6276330

The complaint Mr E complains that Santander UK Plc (‘Santander’) hasn’t refunded the money he lost to a cryptocurrency investment scam. Mr E referred his complaint to this service with the help of a professional representative. However, for ease of reading, I’ll refer to Mr E throughout my decision. What happened Around June 2022, Mr E saw an advert on social media about an investment opportunity mining cryptocurrency, which promised high returns. Between 20 June and 27 August 2022, Mr E sent funds to various cryptocurrency exchange platforms and individuals in order to invest and pay fees relating to his investment. In August 2022, Santander notified Mr E that his account was being closed. Mr E opened an account with another banking provider, which I’ll refer to as ‘Bank R’. Mr E used his account with Bank R to make transactions relating to the investment until May 2025. Unbeknownst to Mr E at the time, he was falling victim to a scam. In October 2025, Mr E reported the scam to Santander in the form of a complaint. Santander said it wasn’t responsible for the payments Mr E had sent to the cryptocurrency exchange platforms, as those payments went to his own accounts. Santander also said that Mr E had received more from the individuals than he’d paid to them, meaning there was no financial loss for Santander to reimburse. So, Santander didn’t uphold Mr E’s complaint. Unhappy with Santander’s response, Mr E referred his complaint to this service. Santander subsequently reconsidered Mr E’s complaint. It identified that Mr E had paid one individual more than he had received in return, resulting in a loss of £234 which Santander said it would reimburse once it had received Mr E’s current bank account details. Mr E didn’t accept Santander’s offer. So, our Investigator considered the complaint but didn’t uphold it. They weren’t satisfied that Mr E had provided sufficient evidence that he’d been the victim of a scam or demonstrated what his loss was. As a result, they didn’t think it would be fair to ask Santander to reimburse Mr E. Mr E didn’t accept our Investigator’s opinion. As an informal agreement couldn’t be reached, the complaint was passed to me to decide. After considering the available evidence I was satisfied that Mr E had, most likely, been the victim of a scam. However, I had concerns that: • the circumstances of the scam hadn’t been adequately reported; • the loss hadn’t been reported accurately; and • Santander wouldn’t have been able to prevent Mr E making the disputed payments.

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I wrote to Mr E setting out my thoughts as described above, and I asked him for more information to help me consider the complaint. Mr E responded, but the additional information he provided was brief and lacking in any real detail. So, I’m now proceeding to issue my final decision on the complaint. What I’ve decided – and why I’ve considered all the available evidence and arguments to decide what’s fair and reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint. In deciding what’s fair and reasonable in all the circumstances of a complaint, I’m required to take into account relevant: law and regulations; regulators’ rules, guidance and standards; codes of practice; and, where appropriate, what I consider to have been good industry practice at the time. In broad terms, the starting position at law is that a firm, like Santander, is expected to process payments and withdrawals that a customer authorises, in accordance with the Payment Services Regulations (in this case, the 2017 regulations) and the terms and conditions of the customer’s account. Mr E hasn’t disputed that he made the scam payments. So, the starting position here is that the disputed payments were authorised and, under the Payment Services Regulations, the presumption is that Mr E is responsible for the payments (and the subsequent loss) despite them being made as the result of a scam. However, that’s not the end of the story. Good industry practice required Santander to be on the lookout for account activity or payments that were unusual or out of character to the extent that they might indicate a fraud risk. On spotting such a payment, I’d expect it to take steps to warn the customer about the risks of proceeding. There are occasions when firms fail to identify suspicious transactions or provide adequate scam education and warnings in response to a fraud risk. However, a failure by a firm doesn’t automatically mean they can be held responsible for the customer’s loss. To uphold a complaint, I’d need to be persuaded that proportionate intervention in response to a fraud risk would, more likely than not, have had a positive impact on identifying the scam and preventing the loss. Mr E says Santander didn’t do enough to protect him from the scam and it would therefore be unfair to conclude that he wouldn’t have responded positively to proportionate interventions if these had taken place. I accept Santander should’ve done more in the circumstances. So, I’ve considered the available evidence to decide if Mr E would’ve most likely acted differently in response to better scam education and warnings. Despite the scam lasting almost three years and involving over 500 incoming and outgoing transactions, Mr E has been able to provide very little evidence in support of his complaint. Mr E’s also provided very little in the way of testimony about how the scam happened or why he made or received payments. As a result, I have a lot of unanswered questions about how the scam worked and how much money Mr E has actually lost. I know, from experience, that cryptocurrency investment scams often involve a significant amount of coaching from the scammers. The scammers will give advice on which accounts or digital wallets to open; provide assistance on how to create the relevant facilities; and provide step-by-step instructions on how to deposit funds, convert them into cryptocurrency and send the cryptocurrency on.

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Mr E hasn’t specifically said he was being coached by the scammers. However, he has said that the scammers were in “constant and regular contact”. And Mr E used a large number of cryptocurrency exchanges and individuals to ensure the scam payments (totalling approximately £150,000 over a three-year period) were successful. To my mind that suggests that Mr E most likely was receiving a substantial amount of coaching from the scammers and, given the value of payments over a significant period of time, this also suggests that Mr E was heavily under the scammer’s spell. There were occasions, after Mr E began making payments from his account with Bank R, when he appeared to have some doubts about what he was doing. He reported to Bank R, three separate times, that he was concerned about having fallen victim to a scam. However, when prompted by Bank R to provide information and evidence, Mr E failed to respond and very quickly resumed making scam payments. That suggests to me that the scammers were able to alleviate any concerns he may have had and were able to persuade him to continue engaging with the scam investment. What little evidence has been provided does show coaching from the scammer on how to answer questions about payments and inaccurate answers were provided to Bank R when some transactions were questioned. Mr E doesn’t appear to have been concerned by this. Nor does he appear to have been concerned by Santander closing his bank account after he was unable to provide a satisfactory explanation of his entitlement to funds that he had received as part of the scam. Ultimately, the scam hasn’t been sufficiently explained, and I’m not satisfied that Mr E’s loss has been accurately reported. And I think there is more evidence to suggest that Mr E would’ve ignored proportionate intervention than there is evidence to suggest appropriate questions, warnings and scam education would’ve, most likely, worked. As a result, I’m not persuaded Santander can fairly be held responsible for reimbursing Mr E in the circumstances. Mr E has explained that all the scam payments he made were cryptocurrency purchases, either by sending funds to his own accounts with cryptocurrency exchange platforms or purchasing cryptocurrency directly from individuals (a practice better known as a peer-to- peer cryptocurrency purchase). And the scam wasn’t reported to Santander until more than three years after his account had been closed. As a result, I don’t think Revolut had any reasonable prospect of recovering any of Mr E’s loss. I’m satisfied that Mr E has been the victim of a cruel scam and lost a life changing amount as a result. Whilst I have natural sympathy for him, I’m not persuaded Santander could’ve prevented or recovered his loss. So, I don’t think it would be fair to hold Santander liable for the transactions Mr E has made due to the scam. Although I’m not satisfied Santander can be held responsible for Mr E’s loss, Santander has offered to refund £234 to Mr E. And our Investigator has recently provided Santander with Mr E’s current bank account details. So, Santander can now proceed to make that payment (if it hasn’t already done so). My final decision For the reasons explained above, my final decision is that I don’t uphold this complaint.

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Under the rules of the Financial Ombudsman Service, I’m required to ask Mr E to accept or reject my decision before 25 May 2026. Liam Davies Ombudsman

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