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MPs criticise ‘flawed’ plans to reimburse scam victims

MPs slam ‘fundamentally flawed’ plans to hand responsibility for reimbursing scam victims to banking industry body

MPs have slammed ‘fundamentally flawed’ plans to hand responsibility for reimbursing scam victims to a banking industry body.

The Treasury committee said putting Pay.UK in charge of getting money to customers could further hold up the ‘painfully slow’ setting up of the scheme.

Harriett Baldwin, chairman of the committee, said it was ‘like asking a fox to guard the henhouse’.

‘Fundamentally flawed’: The plans centre on authorised push payment fraud, in which account holders are tricked into sending someone a payment

The plans centre on authorised push payment fraud, in which account holders are tricked into sending someone a payment.

The Payment Systems Regulator proposes to force banks to provide full reimbursement to victims within two days of the scam being reported, in cases where the loss is more than £100.

In today’s report MPs say handing responsibility for the scheme to Pay.UK, which is backed by banks and building societies, creates an ‘inherent conflict of interest’.

The plans have already been delayed until 2024. Baldwin said the proposals are a step in the right direction but implementation of them is ‘fundamentally flawed’.