The expert has urged people to be extra vigilant if booking a holiday in the next few weeks
A BBC Morning Live expert has shared a warning to anyone set to book a holiday online. In its urgent warning, hosts Gethin Jones and Holly Hamilton said one viewer was left £4,000 out of pocket to a ‘travel company’.
“She says they promised her a holiday that never actually materialised”, Holly explained. Keen to remain anonymous, Gethin said she wanted to “make sure her experience serves as a warning for holidaymakers looking to make a booking over the next few weeks.”
Making a reconstruction using a member of the BBC team, a woman’s voice explained: “A few weeks ago, I was looking to book flights to Bangkok with my daughter. We used to live in Thailand, and it’s always really special to go back when we get the chance.
“I was using all the mainstream comparison websites to look up flights, and later on noticed that my social media feeds started to fill up with adverts for the same thing. There were cheap deals being flashed in my face, so I did what anyone would do and started browsing some of those offers.
“That’s when I found myself on a legitimate-looking website. They were promising 50% off with one of the major airlines, so I filled in my details and then forgot about it. Then I got a call out of the blue.”
Scam Interceptors’ Nick Stapleton said: “It’s a very tricky one. It’s kind of hard to work out exactly where she might have gone wrong, if she went wrong at all – which I’m not saying she did, because it’s quite normal what she was doing. She was just using her phone to search for flights, do price comparisons on different websites.”
The expert further explained that phones and social media apps track your online searches, so after looking something up in a web browser, you may start seeing related ads on social media. Since scam ads are common on these platforms, the person likely encountered a scam because the algorithm targeted them based on their recent searches.
The woman’s voice continued: “I had a good chat with the person on the other end of the phone. They talked me through the itinerary and the final price, and I was sold, so I decided to go ahead. Altogether, the two return flights from London to Bangkok came to around £1,200, so I gave the caller my card details, and they began to process the payment.
“Oddly, the person on the other end told me that the money hadn’t gone through, so we tried again – another twelve hundred pounds. The same thing happened. It was only after the third time of trying that I decided to check my account, and to my horror realised that I had just over £3,800 taken off me.”
At this point, she has lost almost £4,000, and she’s not booked anything. Nick said she received what appeared to be a genuine confirmation email about her flights.
Talking about the email pictured below, Nick said “this is completely fake”. He also admitted, “even at first glance, I thought ‘wow, that’s a really legitimate-looking itinerary.'”
Nick confirmed: “I heard from Emirates and they said it’s absolutely not from them at all.”
The woman explained: “I was obviously fairly distressed at having three times the amount I was expecting going out of my account, but I did just think it was a mistake. And the person I was speaking to was assuring me that I’d have the extra two amounts returned, so I wasn’t in panic mode at that stage.
“But it was when a fourth request came through on my banking app for £1,500 while I was still on the phone that my blood ran cold, and I realised something was wrong.
“The person at the other end assured me that this was normal and that I needed this additional £1,5000 to trigger the whole refund – but that was obviously a lie. I didn’t know what to do, so I hung up and started the process of trying to undo what had happened.”
Nick stressed legitimate companies never ask you to pay in order to receive a refund – that’s not how refunds work. He explained that the scammers kept asking for more money because the victim continued paying.
Since she used an overseas bank account, getting her money back may be harder than if she had used a UK bank. However, the bank has blocked the company that took the money, and she has reported the scam to the police.
Nick said: “I would really encourage people to be super diligent on and ideally don’t click through on ads you see on social media. Just do things your own way outside of that platform.
“On this occasion, this incredibly cheap offer popped up at exactly the right moment when she’d just been searching. The flights that she was offered were 50% off what she was expecting to pay.
“Always look at the price comparison websites first. If you suddenly then see something on social media that is literally 50% less than what you’re seeing elsewhere on price comparison websites, that is 100% going to be a scam to me.”
While Nick said there may be some better deals elsewhere, half off is “far too much.” Sadly, the woman has still not received her money back. Nick said he hopes to check in with her and get a “good result.”
