Credit Card And Banking Scam Nets £900,000

A scam involving some employees in shops, restaurants, service stations and bank, has netted the fraudsters almost £1m.

Police said staff working behind the tills or in call centres stole almost £900,000 in three separate ‘stings’ after obtaining customers’ credit card and bank details. It is believed to be one the largest and most organised fraud scams seen in the UK.

Detectives described the crimes as some of the most complex they had seen. The frauds have resulted in 29 people pleading guilty to their part in the crimes.

Details of one the scams revealed an employee at Clarks Shoes in Stansted Airport had wired the store’s till to copy customers credit card details when they made transactions. This resulted in £70,000 being scammed.

One other scam saw two workers at a Leeds call centre for HSBC, access customer accounts and transfer funds to gang members.

This conspiracy is one of the most common as organised gangs have been known to either approach existing employees or place employees in jobs were they will have access to either customers credit card or bank details. These fraudsters then have the opportunity to copy or ‘skim’ customers details proceeding to pass them on to gangsters who then fraudulently use these details before the victims realise.

The third fraud case involved workers in Indian restaurants in Leicester, service stations in Newark and Manchester, and the tube station at Canary Warf. The staff at these establishments either copied customers’ credit card details or allowed the use of fake cards at these premises.

According to Det Insp Phil Smith, who led the investigation for Leicester Police, said the frauds were discovered after an inquiry into the use of a cloned credit card.

“ What started as a simple investigation has turned into one of the most complex inquiries I have come across,” he said.

According to police, the ‘mastermind’ behind most of the frauds was Rizwan Khan, 22, of Leicester.

After a search of Mr Khan’s home and car, police found documents and credit cards that linked him to illegal transactions.

Although not linked to the HSBC scam, police said the evidence they gathered played a crucial part in the prosecution of those involved in the other scams.

As sentencing was handed down, Mr Khan was given 27 months for conspiracy to defraud retailers and a further three and a half months for conspiring to defraud Clarks.

Nine other men received sentences ranging from a year to three and a half years.

The introduction and success of Chip-and-Pin has seen a drop credit card fraud such as ‘ skimming’ as customers now have to key in their pin number for credit and debit card transactions thus eliminating the chance of the card being out of the customer’s sight. The banking industry hopes that Chip-and-Pin will further reduce these types of fraud.

Alisdair Milton
5th May 2006

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