These days it’s quite easy to be defrauded of your money. Online fraud, cybercrimes and scams abound. What happens if your money’s stolen? What actions can you take?
Three Types of Online Money Fraud
There are many ways to transfer money. Thanks to technology, sending money across the world takes only a few minutes. But what happens when this great technology falls into the hands of crooks?
In this article, we’ll explain the types of actions that should be taken with our assistance. There are three typical ways that fraudulent companies use to transfer money:
1). Debit card: “I should give them my debit details because it’s safer this way…”
This is what most people think, but the truth is that this method of canceling payments is more difficult, and most of the time impossible. The problem is that in case the service, which you paid for, is not delivered or is not delivered as promised, you have a tight window of only 90-120 days from the day of the transaction. In case the transaction is within this time frame, a chargeback is needed. What is a “Chargeback”?
“Chargeback” is the term used for disputing the transactions made by the cardholder, with the merchant’s bank account, on the amount of the transaction that had been previously credited. There are a number of different reasons why a transaction will be charged back, but they mainly fall into these categories:
· The merchant has made an error at the point of sale; for example, an expired card has been used.
· The cardholder or the Card Issuing Company (“the Issuer”) is disputing the transaction. For example, the card or cardholders were not present at the point of sale and possible fraud may have taken place.
· The client paid for service A, but received service B.
· The client paid but did not get the service he paid for.
This may refer to cases that don’t include money transferred to gambling websites (such as Binary/Forex/Crypto trading). As of late, the banking systems refuse to refund any transactions that involve gambling or investing websites. The liability for these types of transactions are solely on the bank account owner.
In this case, you should use a different method as mentioned in section three.
2). Credit card: “Take more credit to take better trades…”
This phrase is one of the most common catch phrases “brokers” use. Their only mission is to take as much as they can, so credit is a valuable tool for taking money the client doesn’t own. In fact, a real financial broker working in a regulated company is not allowed to use phrases such as this, because in that case, he is using his authority to serve his own interest but puts the client at a much higher risk.
A licensed broker is gaining profit from trading volume, spread and deposit of the client.
On the other hand, a scammer, who is pretending to be a broker, is gaining profit only from the deposit of the client. Meaning that scammers are making a profit only when the client is losing his money.
On April 2018, MasterCard and Visa policies were changed regarding gambling and/or trading and/or investing in websites. From that date, both credit card companies have refused to refund/dispute any transactions that were done successfully and with the approval of the cardholder involving gambling or investing websites.
If you have transferred serious amounts of money to scammers using your credit card, you can find a solution to your problem in section three.
3). Wire Transfer:
When it comes to wire transfers, unfortunately, after making the transfer even in a case of providing incorrect information of the receiver, you cannot cancel the transfer.
Meaning that your only option to receive the funds back is if the receiver will agree to refund the money back to you.
If you are a victim, and you’re reading this article, then you already know that the company which defrauded you at this stage is not willing to refund you the scammed funds.
In this case, you will need to know who the people behind the fraud are. Only after conducting a deep investigation into the people who defrauded you, should you start taking action.
Meaning you will need to know who operated the scam, from what country they are, where they are located, and most importantly, to have evidence to prove such claims.
The actions that a lawyer can offer in such cases are mainly two options:
The first is to contact the people behind the fraud and to try to negotiate with them in order to give you a refund.
If this fails, a lawyer will offer to file a civil lawsuit against the company, on your behalf.
It is common that victims receive a refund from the fraudsters after filing a lawsuit in negotiation process.
We are not a law firm, but we can provide you with the necessary cyber investigation services and/or recommend a law firm that has already managed to help other victims from around the world. The firm has experience with cases such as Binary/Forex/Crypto fraud. Take into consideration that without the relevant evidence, your lawsuit can be dismissed by a judge.