How do I help someone who is being scammed and will not believe me?

Romance fraud and long-running investment fraud both produce the same situation: someone you love is sending money to a person who does not exist, and every attempt to say so pushes them further away. That reaction is engineered. Part of the script is telling the victim in advance that their family will not understand and will try to interfere.

Safety

Step by step

1. Understand why direct confrontation fails.The criminal has pre-loaded the objection. Every warning you give confirms what they were told would happen, and it costs the victim something to agree with you — admitting the relationship, the investment or the friendship was never real.
2. Ask questions rather than making statements.How did you meet? Have you spoken on video? What happens if you say no this time? Where is the money going and whose name is on the account? Questions leave the conclusion with them, which is the only way it ever sticks.
3. Focus on the money route, not the relationship."Why does a genuine person need you to send money through a third party's account?" is answerable. "He does not exist" is not, and it ends the conversation.
4. Contact their bank.Banks have vulnerable customer teams and can apply extra checks, delay payments and speak to the customer directly. You can raise a concern about someone else's account, and under the Banking Protocol branch staff can involve the police at the counter. The bank will not discuss their account with you, but it can act on what you tell it.
5. Use adult safeguarding if they are a vulnerable adult.If the person has care and support needs and is at risk of financial abuse, the local authority's adult safeguarding team has a statutory duty to look into it. Financial abuse by a stranger counts. This is a real, underused route.
6. Bring in a third party they respect.A sibling, a GP, an old friend, a bank manager. Sometimes the same words from a different person land when yours cannot, particularly where the family relationship is itself part of what is being exploited.
7. Gather evidence without confronting them with it.Reverse image searches of the photographs, the account name the money goes to, the domain of the trading platform. Hold it until it is useful — evidence deployed as an accusation gets rejected.
8. Keep the relationship intact.This is the hard one. The point at which they realise is the point at which they need someone, and if the last conversation was a row, they will not ring. Say plainly that you will not raise it again, that you love them, and that you are there when they want you.
9. Report it yourself.You can report to Action Fraud, or Police Scotland on 101, as a third party. Do it — it does not require their consent and it builds the picture of an organised group.

Tips

• Do not lend or give them money to replace what has gone. It funds the next payment and it makes you part of the pattern.
• If they are about to travel abroad to meet the person, treat that as an emergency. There is a real risk of being used to carry money or goods, and of being detained for it.
• Look after yourself. Watching this happen is exhausting and it goes on for months. Victim Support helps families as well as victims.

Common mistakes

• Presenting the evidence as an ultimatum — It forces them to choose between you and the story they have invested in, and the sunk cost usually wins. Evidence works better as a question.
• Taking over their finances without agreement — Unless there is a legal power to do it, it is unlawful and it destroys trust. Use the bank and safeguarding routes instead.
• Saying I told you so afterwards — It guarantees they will not tell you next time, and repeat targeting means there is very likely to be a next time.

Questions people ask