Shaun Doane: Sheffield singer loses £2k in phone scam

A singer who lost almost £2,000 in a phone scam said "the bottom fell out of my world" when he realised what had happened.

Shaun Doane, 54, was pressured by scammers who told him he needed to move his money into another bank account following alleged fraudulent activity.

Mr Doane, who was frontman of cult Sheffield band The Everly Pregnant Brothers until December, was still waiting to see if his bank could recover the lost money.

"I was just in bits," he said.

Sharing his story to try and stop others falling for the scam, he said on Wednesday 10 April, a caller claimed to be from his bank and already had key information, such as his card number.

He was told there had been a transaction in Belfast and he needed to cancel his card and move his money into "a safe account".

"Immediately you're panicking because you think, 'How?, I don't understand', the entertainer told BBC Radio Sheffield.

"He [the caller]... started asking questions about, 'Did I use my card in the last 24 hours?', he said, 'These are the last four numbers on your card, this is your CVV on the back'."

Thinking he was speaking to a genuine member of bank staff, he used his mobile banking app to transfer the money into another account, controlled by the scammers.

"All the time they keep talking at you, talking about how urgent it is, everything is aimed to get you more and more flustered," he said.

Once the money had been moved, the call "went dead".

"When I heard no answer, I knew. The bottom fell out of my world," he added.

New research from Age UK found a fifth of over 50s in the UK fear answering their phones because of scams.

According to the Crime Survey for England and Wales, an average of four people aged over 50 in England and Wales are scammed every minute, it added.

He immediately called a number on the back of his bank card to report the fraud, with them being "good and reassuring".

Mr Doane was told it might take six weeks for an investigation to take place, but there was no guarantee he would get the money back.

"For me, the worry is it's not just people like me that they're exploiting, its people who aren't tech savvy, people who don't know how the banking app works," he added.

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