Building firm wins battle with O2 over £10k fraud

Lisa Palmer said she was left feeling "sick to the bottom of her stomach" after being the victim of fraud

The owners of a small building firm said they were left worried for the future after a fraudster racked up a £10,000 bill using the company’s name.

A scammer took out four mobile phone contracts with network provider, O2 claiming to be from Palmer’s Building Services, based near Norwich.

Business owner Lisa Palmer said she had “cried down the phone” to O2 when trying to tell the firm the contracts had nothing to do with them.

O2 said it had since closed the fraudulent account, wiped the debt and amended the victim’s credit files.

Mrs Palmer said the experience had left her feeling "sick to the bottom of her stomach" and "really emotional".

Before taking out the contracts with O2, the fraudster had attempted something similar with the network providers Vodafone and Three.

Both companies closed down the accounts due to suspicious activity.

The scammer also attempted to sign up to a John Lewis store card.

But Mrs Palmer said that O2 remained convinced that the four contracts had been taken out by her family business.

'Sophisticated fraudsters'

She claimed that every time she tried to communicate with O2’s customer services team over the phone, she was unable to pass the security steps as she did not know the passwords set up by the fraudster.

Mrs Palmer and her husband Liam were later contacted by debt collectors who threatened to take action.

An O2 spokesperson said: “This account was opened by sophisticated fraudsters using a substantial amount of the victims’ personal data and identity documents which allowed them to successfully pass security and credit checks in one of our stores.”

According to the National Crime Agency, £2.46bn was lost by businesses and individuals to fraud in 2021/22.

It said that all cases of fraud should be reported to Action Fraud, the UK’s national fraud and cyber crime reporting centre.

The O2 spokesperson added: “We regularly evolve our processes to keep consumer safe from fraud, and last year alone we prevented £70m of fraudulent activity.”