A man from the West Midlands has told how he was devastated after falling victim to a scam via social media.
HSBC, which helped the man to get his money back, said the customer was contacted by someone claiming to be a young woman living in the United States, whose parents had died when she was young.
It was claimed that she was due to come into a large inheritance, and also that her grandmother was ill and was struggling to buy food due to medical bills.
The person who contacted the HSBC customer used personal information he had given her previously to apply online for two loans in his name with two different payday loan companies. The money was transferred into his account and totalled £14,000.
The customer did not initially realise the money came from loans and he was led to believe it was part of the inheritance and that she needed him to distribute it to several accounts as she did not have a bank account.
But when he received letters from the loan companies he realised that he had been scammed.
He visited his local HSBC UK branch and the scams team was able to able to identify the payments and issue a refund.
He said: "Looking back now I can't believe how easy it was for her to take advantage of me - I had no idea she was tricking me into giving out my personal details so she could get money.
"Once I found out about the loans I was devastated, I've always been so good with money.
"I was panicking about how I would pay the loans back and explain the situation to my family."
He said HSBC staff were calm and helpful, adding: "I have now shut down my social media account because I don't want to get into a relationship with anyone else that way.
"It's going to take me a long time to get over this and be able to trust anybody again."
