Revolut Scams
Can I get my money back?
Revolut is a fintech company with a current account banking app that operates in the UK and elsewhere. As they are regulated in the UK, if you have lost money to a Revolut scam and your account is in the UK, you may be able to get your money back from your bank.
FCA Regulated
UK’s best-ratedREVOLUT FRAUD
Fraudsters target customers of all banks in the UK, including Revolut
We speak to victims of APP fraud from all banks. Customers often ask us whether they can get money back from a bank transfer when they have been scammed, and the answer is yes that victims may be able to get a refund.
The fraud figures for each bank have not been published publicly, so there is no exact figure on how many of their customers fall victim to fraud or how many are refunded. However, a recent publication showed that 77% of Revolut cases independently reviewed led to the result being overturned in the customer's favour. Therefore, you really should look at your rights or seek help from Refundee if you’ve been a victim of a scam and sent the money from or to a Revolut account.
TRANSFER FRAUD
Bank Transfer Scams and APP Fraud
This is where you are tricked by a criminal into sending money from your bank account to an account controlled by a scammer. Common types of APP scams include:
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Investment
Enticing but ultimately fraudulent investments
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Safe account
You think your bank is calling you
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Purchase
Paying for goods/services you never receive
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Romance
Fraudsters usually start fake relationships online
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Invoice
You pay a bill to the wrong person
There are many more, but these common frauds involve customers being persuaded to send money for reasons they think are legitimate, but are unfortunately not. APP scams have grown massively in size in recent years, with fraud losses in 2021 topping £583.2 million in the UK and almost 200,000 cases being recorded. We believe this is probably well below the true figure. Scammers unfortunately are professionals at manipulation and often have spent a long time practising their social engineering techniques. This is shown in the statistics, and it is Refundee’s view that banks should be doing more to protect their customers.
If you lost money from a Revolut account, contact us today for a free consultation.
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Often, victims may be tricked into sending the money to a cryptocurrency wallet in your own name and then to the scammer. Where that happens, we may still be able to help. Banks should have known about this type of scam for a long time, as it has been common for a number of years.
Transfers to cryptocurrency wallets and then to scammers are often investment scams. This is another type of APP fraud that usually involves a fake broker or trader which pretends to trade and shows good results. Scammers tricking victims into sending money via cryptocurrency is one of the recent investment fraud trends in the UK, with Action Fraud regularly warning banks and others about the scam risks. Victims are tricked into sending the money into a cryptocurrency wallet, and then from there into a fake trading account that appears to be legitimate. Unfortunately, the training account is actually an investment scam.
Banks like Revolut should still be protecting customers when they make payments like this into cryptocurrency wallets, and so Refundee can still fight the case for you.
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There is a new SMS text scam involving impersonation of the bank that is growing in size and catching out victims in the UK. Which? Has warned that this Revolut scam is a recent fraud trend in UK Bank transfer scams and is a new approach to ‘phishing’ SMS messages.
Members of the public have reported receiving SMS messages claiming to be from Revolut telling them that their payment has been scheduled, and to call a number in the SMS message if this was not set up by the individual. The message pretends that your call will go through to Revolut itself, but it is a scammer on the line trying to trick you into a scam.
An example posted on the Which? Website showed the message mentioning a specific location for a transaction and a unique reference to make it seem legitimate:
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This is likely a type of ‘safe account scam’ where the scammer pretends to be your bank and tells you your account is under threat and you need to urgently move it to a new account they've created. Your bank would never ask you to do this, but a scammer would. In this situation when you call the number they would use this unrecognised transaction you are calling back to convince you someone has accessed your details and that the only way to protect your account is to transfer it. This is often called an ‘impersonation scam’, a ‘safe account scam’ and more generally APP Fraud.
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This depends on how the money moved, and when it was sent. There is new regulation that was introduced on the 7th October 2024. This sets a much higher bar for payment providers, and should mean more people get a refund. However, this only applies to UK bank transfers, and not if the money moved to cryptocurrency or internationally.
In addition, we have seen occasions where Revolut will over use exceptions to deny reimbursement. For example, where they unfairly state that a case is a civil dispute or where they said that the customer should have taken more care.
We have, on numerous occasion, been able to disprove this position and achieve a refund for our customers.
REVOLUT REIMBURSEMENT
Can you get money back from Revolut if scammed?
Revolut is covered by the PSR’s Mandatory Reimbursement regulation. This means that they’re expected to refund customers, except for when they can prove that the customer acted with ‘gross negligence’.
It had not signed the historic Contingent Reimbursement Model Code (relevant to bank transfers from 28/05/19 to 06/10/24), sometimes called the authorised push payment scam code. This means that Revolut had not signed up to the stronger protection for fraud victims that the contingent reimbursement model provides as other banks have.
The CRM Code says that firms should refund fraud victims, unless they provided a thorough and relevant warning which was ignored or if the customer did not have a reasonable basis for belief. Put simply, if the firm didn’t give a really good warning that was relevant to you, or if the scam was convincing, your bank should refund you.
Regardless of whether the contingent reimbursement model applies, Chase Bank should be protecting fraud victims by responding to fraud trends and taking steps to stop fraudulent payments. The area we have seen customers of Chase Bank contact us most often, has been where they have been tricked into sending large sums of money into cryptocurrency without being asked any questions by the bank.