Fraud

What we often see with PayPal-related scams is that the fraudster uses a money transfer request. You can submit a request to somebody for payment and this can be used for requesting payment for an invoice, and when you login to your PayPal, you will see an option to send the money or cancel the transaction. In these types of cases, that transaction will appear with a note saying this is a suspected fraudulent transaction and gives us a call. ...It passes all the tests we've been taught to do. It appears legitimate, and you can log into your PayPal account and see the transaction sitting there. So it gives it a vEneer of legitimacy..."

Having that face to face contact, being able to speak to somebody, is really important particularly when you're suffering from a fraud. We've seen where staff in branches have been trained to spot a red flag of a fraud that they are actually able to help victims and prevent huge amount of fraud from happening. The report calls for an acceleration of what's called the banking protocol - which is the good practice for how staff idenitfy potential victims of fraud and an acceleration of that into telephone and online banking which is clearly what more and more of us are doing particularly as you say as more and more branches close....