Settlego Solutions Limited · DRN-6100798

The complaint Mr J complains that Settlego Solutions Limited trading as OpenPayd (SSL), didn’t do enough to prevent him from losing money to a scam. What happened The detailed background to this complaint is well known to both parties. So, I’ll only provide an overview of some of the key events here. In 2024, Mr J says he was the victim of a scam. He was tricked into instructing two transfers from his account with a bank ‘N’ to an account with an International Bank Account Number (IBAN) that is linked to SSL. He says the payments both took place on 11 December 2024 and were for €2,598 and €9,900. In March 2025 Mr J contacted SSL to share his concerns about suspicious activity and to enquire about potentially recovering his funds. SSL’s responses said that they provide virtual IBAN services to corporate clients. And that the payments referenced went to a customer of one of their regulated clients in Canada who I’ll refer to as ‘P’. They provided P’s contact details. Mr J complained to our service. He says that he hasn’t been able to get anywhere with a complaint to P and believes SSL have responsibility for his loss. One of our Investigators considered the complaint and didn’t recommend it should be upheld. Mr J disagrees and has asked for an Ombudsman to review 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. Having done so, there isn’t a great deal I can add to what our Investigator has already said, I’ve reached the same outcome and for similar reasons. I appreciate that Mr J is at a loss as a result of the alleged scam, but that doesn’t automatically entitle him to redress from SSL. Here, SSL were involved in the transfers, but that involvement was limited to providing a service to P. P appear to be a legitimate firm, regulated in Canada by the appropriate authorities. So I don’t think there would’ve been any issues when SSL onboarded P as a client. And I understand that the payments ended up in one of P’s customer’s accounts. SSL don’t have any responsibility for the accounts that P provides. Similarly, they aren’t required to monitor (and wouldn’t necessarily have oversight of) P’s customer’s accounts. In short, I don’t think there were any errors in SSL’s involvement here or there are any actions that fairly could’ve been expected of them which would’ve prevented Mr J’s loss. Mr J contacted SSL directly in March 2025. The usual process to report an allegation of payments being made as a result of a scam is through the sending bank and his letter at that time was more of an enquiry than explicitly making the allegation of a scam. When Mr J

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contacted SSL directly, I wouldn’t necessarily expect a payment processor like them to do more than referring him back to his sending bank in the first instance and potentially to pass his concerns on to P. But even if I’m wrong on this and they ought to have treated this as the allegation of a scam (which for clarity I don’t think they should’ve until later), I’m not persuaded this could be said to be causal to the loss he is claiming. I’ve not seen any evidence to support that SSL were on notice of any issue with the payments prior to March 2025. And this is several months after they were made. It’s very common in scam cases for funds to be quickly moved on from the recipient accounts. And I don’t think it’s more likely than not that funds would’ve been available for recovery in that timeframe. So even if there were errors in this regard by SSL, this wouldn’t change my mind as to the outcome of the complaint. I’m sorry this still leaves Mr J at a loss, but as I don’t think SSL are responsible for any errors that caused it, there isn’t a reasonable basis upon which I can fairly require them to do more to resolve this complaint. My final decision For the reasons outlined above, my final decision is that I don’t uphold this complaint. Under the rules of the Financial Ombudsman Service, I’m required to ask Mr J to accept or reject my decision before 26 May 2026. Richard Annandale Ombudsman

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