How a hopeful homeowner lost $50,000 after just one phone call from HSBC scam artist – and the one sign that made her realise she was being duped
A young woman was left devastated after a bank fraud caused her to lose $50,000 she had been saving for a down payment on a new home.
Julie Khoo, a Melbourne woman, answered a call at work in October 2023 that she thought was from HSBC.
Minutes later, two transactions withdrew a total of $50,000 from her account.
Ms Khoo has been a loyal customer of HSBC for more than a decade and the heartbreaking scam took place shortly after her father’s death just three months earlier.
In October 2023, Julie Khoo answered a call at work that she believed was from HSBC’s fraud department
Two transactions debited her account for a total of $50,000, her daily transfer limit
She said the ‘articulate’ caller claimed he was from HSBC’s fraud team and alerted her to suspicious activity on her account.
The scammer on the other end of the line spent 30 minutes trying to convince her that the call was legitimate, providing details only her bank knew.
Ms Khoo was asked for her passcode to prevent a fraudulent transaction, with the caller emphasizing that she needed the information ‘now’.
Her daily transfer limit of $50,000 was then stolen from her account.
Ms Khoo realized something was wrong when the caller asked for her credit card details.
She contacted HSBC hoping they would halt the transactions and give her some advice.
“I knew the money was leaving my account, but I didn’t know it was gone,” Ms Khoo said 7News.
“I really believed they could recover the money.”
“They said they would investigate, go to the branch the next day and report it to the police.”
Ms Khoo said the bank’s branch manager told her there was no need to report it to the police, but she did so anyway.
She lashed out at the bank, saying she was disappointed by HSBC’s response.
Ms Khoo said that six months after the scam, she has only been notified twice by email and is still waiting for her money to be returned.
After migrating to Australia from Malaysia in 2017 and now losing her deposit for a new home, Ms Khoo said the scam has left her shocked.
‘I couldn’t look at myself. “I felt embarrassed and ashamed,” she said.
“I now screen all my calls – my confidence has been shaken.
An HSBC Australia Scam Victims Facebook page has been set up where customers post their experiences and offer advice
“We understand that being a victim of fraud is a stressful and distressing situation and we remain focused on doing everything we can to protect our customers,” HSBC said.
Sadly, Ms Khoo is one of many HSBC customers falling victim to scammers.
An HSBC Australia Scam Victims Facebook page has been set up where customers post their experiences and offer advice.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has revealed that HSBC customers lost more than $6.3 million in the eight months to March 2024 due to a ‘spoofing’ text message scam.
Daily Mail Australia contacted HSBC for comment on Ms Khoo’s case.
In response, the bank said that as a result For privacy reasons they cannot discuss specific customer situations.
“We understand that being a victim of fraud is a stressful and distressing situation and we remain focused on doing everything we can to protect our customers,” they said.
‘Protecting our customers is our priority and we continue to strengthen existing initiatives and implement new ones, while also playing our part in supporting the wider financial services sector in this area.’
HSBC said it continues to educate its customers and will never ask them to provide PINs, passwords or verification codes during a phone call, in response to a text message or email.
Ms Khoo says the bank is not going far enough to protect customers.
“Scammers targeted HSBC customers for a year because they could get away with it, and it is HSBC’s inaction that allowed this to continue,” she said.
‘This isn’t good enough.’