4 Months After, UBA fails to investigate fraudulent withdrawal of N255,000 from customer’s account 

“Please be informed that we are conducting an investigation into the allegation(s) raised in your letter, and we implore you to stay further proceedings in this matter until you hear from us,” a letter from UBA addressed to Chris A. Ekhasemomhe & Co., solicitors for Taiyelolu Ibitogbe, a UBA customer, read in part.

UBA had received a letter from Ibitogbe’s solicitors exactly one month after he reported a fraudulent withdrawal on his UBA account, in which the bank was queried for its irresponsibility to its customer.

In acknowledgement, UBA dissuaded Ibitogbe’s solicitors from taking further actions while they investigated the issues stated in the letter.

Ibitogbe had visited one of the bank’s Kaduna branches to report physically, fraudulent withdrawals of N200,000, N35,000 and N10,000 twice from his account two days earlier. And barely two hours after he lodged his complaint, he received a call from someone who claimed to be UBA’s customer care agent in Illorin. This agent told Ibitogbe that the person who withdrew the funds from his account said he gave him approval to do so. This claim, Ibitogbe denied.

Letter from Ibitogbe’s solicitor to UBA

He did not give anyone authorisation to withdraw money from his account.

The N255,000 in question was money paid to him by a customer the previous day for the supply of computer systems, and he had immediately called UBA’s customer care line to report the fraudulent withdrawals upon noticing debits on his account, and asked the bank to block his account.

Debit notification of fraudulent withdrawal on Ibitogbe’s account

However, after receiving the strange call from the supposed Illorin customer agent, he visited the bank again on November 15 to report the call.

He said the customer care agent in the bank told him that the phone number was not affiliated with UBA, and that a new UBA bank app was created for his account on November 11.

Ibitogbe did not receive any code or password sent to his device for the activation of this new bank app, and it was through this app that the withdrawals on his account were made.

Since receiving UBA’s letter on November 14 to exercise patience while it investigated, Ibitogbe has not received another correspondence from the bank on his stolen funds.