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A scammer intercepted a genuine invoice and changed the bank details, so you paid them instead of your builder, supplier or solicitor. Invoice and mandate fraud is authorised push payment fraud and the reimbursement rules apply. How to claim, and what to do when your bank blames you.

They get inside the email thread

Either your supplier’s mailbox is compromised, or yours is. The fraudster reads the thread, learns the names, the tone and the amounts, and waits for an invoice to fall due. Nothing looks unusual because until this point nothing is.

The bank details change

You receive what appears to be the same invoice from the same person, with a note that the account has changed — new bank, treasury restructure, an old account under audit. The wording is calm and plausible. Often the reply-to address differs from the original by a single character.

You pay the fraudster

The payment leaves your account exactly as you intended. That is what makes this authorised push payment fraud rather than an unauthorised transaction — you made the payment, but you were deceived into making it to the wrong person.

The money moves within minutes

Funds are usually moved out of the receiving account almost immediately, often split across several accounts. Speed of reporting is the single biggest factor in how much is recovered.

Is invoice fraud covered by the bank reimbursement rules?

Yes. Invoice and mandate fraud is a form of authorised push payment fraud. Since 7 October 2024 the Payment Systems Regulator’s mandatory reimbursement scheme requires the sending bank to reimburse victims of APP fraud on eligible sterling transfers, within five working days, unless it can show one of the narrow exceptions applies. The starting position is that you get your money back.

My bank says I was grossly negligent because I did not check the details. Is that right?

Gross negligence is a high bar and it is for the bank to prove, not for you to disprove. It means significantly more than carelessness. Where a fraudster inserted themselves into a genuine, established thread and mimicked a real supplier, an ordinary person acting reasonably could well have paid it. If the bank refuses on this ground, ask for its reasoning in writing and take it to the Financial Ombudsman Service.

I am a sole trader. Am I covered?

The reimbursement scheme covers consumers, microenterprises and small charities, so many sole traders and small businesses fall inside it. Larger businesses fall outside and are left with a claim against the fraudster, an insurance claim, or an argument with their bank on other grounds — so establish which side of the line you sit on before assuming you have no route.

I lost my house deposit to conveyancing fraud. What now?

Report it to your bank and to Action Fraud immediately, then tell your solicitor and their firm’s compliance officer in writing. Two separate questions follow: whether your bank must reimburse you under the APP rules, and whether the firm bears any responsibility for how the account details were communicated. The Legal Ombudsman and the firm’s professional indemnity insurer are relevant to the second. Pursue both — they are not alternatives.

Who is at fault if my supplier’s email was hacked rather than mine?

For the reimbursement claim it makes little difference, because your claim is against your own bank. It matters commercially, because you and your supplier will disagree about whether the invoice has been paid. That is a contract dispute between the two of you, and it usually turns on whose security failure allowed the interception.

Report to your bank as soon as you know. If it refuses, you generally have six months from its final response to take the complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service, which is free to use. Leaving it longer risks losing that route.

How the scam actually works

This is not a cold call. It is a patient interception of a conversation you were already having, which is exactly why it catches careful people.

The first few hours matter most

Recovery rates fall sharply with time, because the receiving account is emptied quickly. If you have just realised, work through this before anything else.

Conveyancing deposit fraud

The most damaging version of this scam targets house purchases, because the sums are large, the deadline is fixed and the buyer is expecting to be told where to send money. A fraudster reading the conveyancing thread sends new account details shortly before completion, and the buyer pays a deposit that never reaches the solicitor.

If this has happened to you, two claims run in parallel and you should pursue both. The first is against your own bank under the reimbursement rules. The second is a question about the solicitor: how were the account details communicated, what warnings were given, and was the firm’s email compromised? Firms carry professional indemnity insurance for precisely this.

The rule that prevents almost all of it is simple, and worth repeating to anyone about to transfer a large sum: never accept bank details by email alone. Telephone the firm on a number you obtained independently, not one printed in the email, and read the account number back to them before you send anything.

When the bank blames you

The most common refusal in invoice fraud is that you should have checked the details, and that failing to do so was grossly negligent. Push back on that in writing. Gross negligence is a significantly higher standard than carelessness, and the bank has to prove it.

Points worth making, where they are true of your case: the invoice arrived inside a genuine thread with a real supplier you had paid before; the amount and reference matched what you were expecting; the change of details was explained plausibly; you had no warning from the bank at the point of payment; and confirmation of payee either did not flag the mismatch or was not shown to you in a way you could act on.

If the bank maintains its refusal, ask for a final response and take it to the Financial Ombudsman Service. It is free, it is independent of the bank, and if you accept its decision the bank is bound by it.