New Zealand based worker Borja Ares lost $330,000 by scammer pretending to be Citibank employee
A dad is left heartbroken after falling for an elaborate scam and losing $330,000.
New Zealand health worker Borja Ares, 37, lost all of his family’s savings and now feels he has abandoned his wife Alfiya Laxmidhar, 35, and their two children.
The couple, who both work at Whangārei Hospital, sold their house on May 1, wanting to put the money in a savings account until they were ready to buy another.
After paying off their mortgage, they had $330,000 and Mr. Ares searched online for investment opportunities.
Borja Ares (pictured left with his wife Alfiya Laxmidhar) feels ‘an idiot’ for falling for an elaborate $330,000 scam
He found a site that compared interest rates on term deposits and entered his details, triggering the fraud that would soon cost the family all of their savings.
On the same day he entered the details, Mr. Ares was contacted by two men – one calling himself Simon David and the other James Higgins – vying for his investment.
Mr David said that someone claiming to be a Citibank investment broker based in Auckland seemed very genuine and trustworthy so Mr Ares chose to go with him.
The estate agent had a developed, softly spoken English accent, but the call appeared to be from an 09 number in Auckland, so the health worker had no idea it was a scam.
Mr. David’s sales pitch—about options rated triple-A, low risk, and backed by Citibank—was so compelling that Mr. Ares felt he was “automatic” and “controlled like a machine.”
“He got me in his net from the first second… I don’t know how he manipulated me into trusting him in this way,” he told the New Zealand Herald.
After receiving details of various options, Mr Ares opted for a Yorkshire Building Society bond with an interest rate of 13.5 per cent.
He felt his money was safe and was absolutely convinced that it was best for him and his family.
A New Zealand-based healthcare worker lost all of his family’s savings and now feels he has abandoned his wife Alfiya Laxmidhar and their two children. A stock image of a scammer is depicted
Mr. Ares searched online for Mr. David, who had a legitimate LinkedIn profile and said he was a vice president of corporate banking at Citibank.
His profile was subsequently removed by LinkedIn.
The Spanish-born man, who is awaiting his New Zealand citizenship, intended to call Citibank directly to verify the authenticity of the investment, but work and family matters got in the way and he trusted Mr. David anyway.
His wife said she would leave it to him if he talked to her about it and he told Mr David that he wanted to invest $250,000 but was promised $330,000 ($303,000 Australian).
They even told him how to split it into two transfers of $165,000 each when he told them that $330,000 was more than his bank, BNZ, would allow him to transfer in one day.
He did, with the entire process from first contact to the loss of his family’s savings taking 12 days.
It took another nine days for him to realize it was all a sophisticated scam.
At a family dinner, he discussed the investment and mentioned the 13.5 percent interest rate.
Saying it out loud made him realize it sounded way too good to be true. And he soon found out it was when he searched for “Citibank scam” and found that he was far from the first person to fall prey to the vicious scam.
“I guess I’m not a particularly gullible man. I try to be careful. But they got me, they cheated me,” he said.
He contacted Citibank, his own bank, the New Zealand Banking Ombudsman and the police.
Ares said his wife Alfiya Laxmidhar (pictured) doesn’t blame him and she keeps the family together
Mr. Ares was told that the scam was public knowledge and BNZ should have been alert to the risk as he said he was transferring money to a Citibank account.
“Although he said the transfer was for an investment with Citibank, while he said he was transferring the money to his own account, our banker processed the transaction,” a BNZ spokesperson told the NZ Herald.
Despite the huge financial loss and shock of falling for a scam, Mr. Ares that his wife doesn’t blame him and that she keeps the family together.
“We’re safe, the kids are safe, so that’s the comfort we take,” he said.
BNZ is trying to see if it can get the money back from the family.
Citibank said scammers were posing as a bank and it did not offer financial products or services to retail customers, or make unsolicited investment offers.