Bank’s 40c insult to scam victim who lost $10,000

The Queenslander thought it was strange she couldn’t log into her bank account. Then she realised it was the result of scammers.

Janet Moore was scammed out of $10,000 but is not sure what is more insulting – the fact her bank could only recover 40 cents of the stolen funds or that they had accused her daughter of taking the money.

The 86-year-old pensioner regularly checks her Bendigo Bank account online but when she tried to log in one Sunday, her password wasn’t working.

“I thought there’s something funny going on here,” Ms Moore, who lives on the Gold Coast, told news.com.au.

Calling Bendigo Bank and explaining the situation, she said a bank teller told her casually: “Oh, your account has been compromised”.

Ms Moore is lending her support to news.com.au’s campaign People Before Profit, calling on the federal government to make it mandatory for banks to compensate scam victims – just like in the UK.

In October last year, the UK introduced world leading legislation making compensation mandatory for scam victims within five business days unless in cases of gross negligence.

IT’S TIME BANKS PUT PEOPLE BEFORE PROFIT. SIGN THE PETITION HERE.

Janet Moore is refusing to back down against the bank.

Julie-Ann Sperling-Moore was shocked to hear how her mother had been treated.

Scammers made two transactions totalling $10,000 and sent them to account holders called Philippa and David.

Ms Moore said she was then told not to use her bank account or computer. But it was too late.

The loyal Bendigo Bank customer was alarmed to learn scammers had made two transactions in the amounts of $8000 and $2000 which had been transferred out of her account two days earlier in late 2023.

Ms Moore wonders what would have happened if she hadn’t checked her account that Sunday – and how long it would have taken for bank staff to notify her.

“This is where I got cross,” the retiree said. “They should have known on Friday that something was happening.”

Scrambling to recover her money, Ms Moore contacted her daughter Julie-Ann Sperling-Moore.

“My daughter was disgusted,” Ms Moore said. “The money came out of my mortgage redraw. It was sitting there, helping me keep my mortgage interest down.”

Julie-Ann said her mother had been “very conscious” about keeping her money secure throughout her life and was devastated to learn she had been scammed.

The two rushed to the nearest Bendigo branch on the Gold Coast to see if they could rescue the money but were left shocked by the customer service.

Have you been scammed? Get in touch | [e-mail]

They arrived in the middle of some kind of end of year celebration, as the bank tellers wore Christmas hats. Julie-Ann alleges the bank teller they approached “was clearly too flustered and too busy” to help her mum.

Ms Moore told the bank staff member that something awful had happened, and instead of taking her to a private room, she was made to tell the tale right there, with everyone else queuing up within earshot.

The mother-daughter duo weren’t able to sort anything out from the branch visit and had to resort to calling the bank for progress updates.

“Every time she phoned them she had to tell the story again,” Julie-Ann said, saying there was no system where her case was logged to allow staff to get up to speed. “That was just adding to her stress.”

Bendigo Bank was only able to recover 40 cents. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Christian Gilles

On Christmas Day 2023, Ms Moore spent the day with Julie-Ann which turned out to be lucky because a tornado hit her house while she was away.

“My house is halfway up a mountain, a tree came through the roof,” Ms Moore said.

She is now temporarily living with her daughter while her home is repaired.

Despite being informed about the situation, Bendigo Bank continued to call her on the destroyed landline – which the Moores only discovered when they queried why they hadn’t heard anything from the bank.

Ms Moore also hired a tech expert to examine her computer and discovered Anydesk – a software that allows scammers to remotely gain control of a device.

To be safe, Ms Moore now uses a new computer.

Right after the scam happened, Ms Moore was hit by a double whammy when a tree went through her house.

Ms Moore told the bank her house had been partially destroyed, but they claimed they continued to call her on her landline.

The family anxiously waited to hear from their bank in the hopes that they would be reimbursed their money.

Three months after the scam, in February 2024, the bank delivered a crushing blow.

They deemed that the entire saga was Ms Moore’s fault for allowing a third party access to her bank account and refused to pay anything.

“They’ve blamed me all the way through. They keep on about a third person involved,” Ms Moore said.

And the bank implied it might have been her daughter Julie-Ann who took the money, a blatant insult to both.

“Because of my age, my daughter’s name is on my bank account. They were trying to say it was probably her that did it,” Ms Moore said.

The pair were furious and even got affidavits signed to clear Julie-Ann’s name – but still the bank wouldn’t budge.

Bendigo Bank also informed them they had managed to trace the money and recover 40 cents – out of the original $10,000 lost.

The pair have escalated the case to the Australian Financial Complaints Authority.

The bank offered to reimburse Ms Moore $2000 as a “one-off goodwill gesture” but the major caveat was that she had to accept fault, which she wasn’t willing do.

Then Bendigo Bank sent her an email retracting their original compensation offer. The email also said the bank had found their conduct and customer service had been appropriate at all times.

Bendigo Bank then closed the case but were forced to reopen it after the Moores lodged a report to the Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA).

“I’m not letting go – I’m like a terrier. If I was guilty, I wouldn’t be doing this,” Ms Moore said. “$10,000 is a lot of money.”

Julie-Ann said the pair is still waiting on answers from the bank as to why they weren’t alerted to the unusual transactions.

“She’s come to terms with the fact the money’s gone. The main point is we wanted answers, we wanted the bank to say it’s happened because of this, this and this,” she said.

A Bendigo Bank spokesperson said they do not comment on specific customer matters but take cyber security, protecting its customers and safeguarding its systems very seriously by using a variety of cybercrime prevention methods.

[e-mail]

Originally published as Bank’s 40c insult to scam victim who lost $10,000