For almost six years, Matthew Tough has tried to make his bank, Barclays, take responsibility for its part in allowing a £1.49 million fraud against him.
He failed, but not for lack of trying. He has racked up a six-figure legal bill in his quest for justice, hounded the bank for documents and recordings of conversations, and recently wrote a letter to Barclays board members urging them to investigate his case. No one had the courtesy to respond.
Barclays is not for spinning. It has washed its hands of the matter. Unfortunately, my intervention in the case has not changed the bank’s intransigence. It didn’t answer any of my questions – and given what can only be described as a smooth response.
Abandoned: Hard-working Matthew Tough has fought for years to get back the money stolen by scammers
That’s why I’m telling his story today because I think it needs to be heard. In summary, Matt has been treated disgracefully by the bank he worked at, boy and boy. He deserves much better.
For 56-year-old Matt, life goes on: he is a successful entrepreneur building a food purchasing business with the help of a supportive chairman he has known for a long time. Hopefully he earns enough from the company (Procurement Partners) to get his financial life back on track.
But the past six years have taken their toll.
During this time he has visited some terribly dark places, suffered serious mental health issues, received counseling for depression and battled the demon potion. At one point his wife Sarah asked him to leave the parental home.
Right now, Matt feels strong. He has been sober for four months and is back at Sarah’s home in Knowle, West Midlands.
Yet he remains outraged at having to foot the bill for a fraud that he believes (with great credit) should have been avoided had Barclays shown him a duty of care. His legal team has compiled extensive casework and the King’s Counsel’s advice is that the case has significant merit if it goes to trial.
Disturbingly, Barclays played a game of mismanagement with him, assuming he wouldn’t take the case to court because he could literally lose everything if the case was dismissed, and he was forced to pay the bank’s costs to pay.
“I’m not willing to take the chance,” Matt says. ‘Unlike Barclays, I don’t have a bottomless pit of money. I have a wife and a daughter who are important to me and I cannot jeopardize their future any more than I already have.”
The fraud against Matt and Sarah stemmed from the purchase of a house they planned to make in September 2018. This followed the sale of the company he was director of – another food purchasing company called PSL – to caterer Sodexo.
Matt and Sarah had their sights set on a five-bedroom detached house in Hampton in Arden, a few miles from where they lived in Knowle.
“It was our forever home,” Matt says. ‘It was everything I ever wanted in my wildest dreams when I started my working life.’
In September 2018, they agreed a purchase price of £1.5 million, requiring an initial deposit of £150,000, followed by the final payment (including stamp duty) of just over £1.49 million. The deposit was transferred from the Toughs’ account to their lawyers’ Lloyds account. The payment was made at the notary via Matt’s laptop in three parts. Everything went well and the money arrived safely.
Matt’s email account was then hacked between the deposit and the completion payment. The fraudsters were able to change the details on Matt’s lawyers’ payment instruction so that the £1.49 million would go into an RBS account – rather than the lawyer’s Lloyds account.
As Matt was away on business, Sarah said she would visit their local Barclays branch in Knowle and sit down with a member of staff to make the final payment. But the appointment was canceled and she was told to go to the Barclays branch in nearby Solihull instead.
Here she was greeted by a junior clerk and given a document to sign, authorizing the payment. At no point did the clerk make any checks to ensure that the receiving account details were the same as those used for the deposit.
Later that day, Matt received a call from Barclays saying the money would not be transferred until further security checks had been carried out. Feeling suspicious, he contacted Sarah, who called the Solihull branch. She was told everything was fine and payment had been made.
Unfortunately, nothing could be further from the truth. The day before the house purchase was due to take place, the lawyers called to say they had not received the £1.49 million payment.
Matt immediately went to Action Fraud to report the crime. He also contacted Barclays’ fraud department, but the bank said it was not their problem and there was no case to answer – the loss was the Toughs’ fault.
Royal Bank of Scotland did not want to speak to Matt because he was not a customer. The police were helpful and stated that the money had ended up in the RBS account, but had disappeared to 44 accounts worldwide within four hours.
Police also determined the Internet Protocol address of the computer the fraudster used to hack into Matt’s email account.
An arrest was made, but no charges were filed.
Matt was left with two options: accept the enormous loss and move on with his life, or fight
Barclays. He chose the latter, but it has been a battle that has left him battered and bruised as Barclays has steadfastly refused to accept that it was negligent in allowing the £1.49 million to go to a fraudster’s account.
I asked Barclays to explain how it could defend itself against the accusation that it had been negligent in its handling of the Toughs’ house purchase funds. I also wanted to know why it had not made up the money the Toughs had lost and how it could “live” with the consequences of its actions.
The answer was: ‘We fully understand the position our customers find themselves in.
“This scam is a horrific case of criminal theft by a fraudster who hacks and alters a lawyer’s email. This resulted in our client acting on information they believed was accurate and instructing us to make a CHAPS payment to the fraudster’s bank account instead of the intended recipient, his lawyer. As soon as we were alerted, we acted quickly to recover (the) money, but there was nothing left.
‘We always encourage customers to call their lawyer on a trusted number before making a payment, or to send a smaller amount and obtain confirmation of safe receipt before transferring the remaining funds.’
For the record, Matt says Barclays did not advise them to follow the protocol it outlines in its statement. As Matt was unable to complete the transaction, he also lost the £150,000 deposit.
I have also contacted Royal Bank of Scotland for comment.
It was decided not to do that. Yes, the Toughs were not entirely innocent when they allowed this despicable crime to be committed against them, but they were not as negligent as their bank. Justice still needs to be done.
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