And the scammers are so quick off the mark - Thomas Cook almost as soon as the news came out, TV licenses, you name it. We don't get many calls at the moment, thank goodness, but the emails are increasingly clever. Read today that Impersonation fraud (whereby criminals get you to transfer money) is up 60%, fake bills up 45%, Investment scams up 108%, fake invoices (where they intercept invoices and you pay them) up 7%, purchases that never arrive up 43%, cheque fraud up 789% !!! , Romance scams up 50%, mobile banking fraud up 33% with a total of some £207.5million lost to bank scams in the first 6 months of this year. And many won't be repaid by the banks if they authorised payment, even if it was a really clever scam. If you have to pay your builder, accountant, or anyone who sends you an invoice, it's worth double checking on the phone with them what their bank details are. We'll have to go back to cash in hand!!
Alison Fraser ● 2602d