ICICI Bank — Atm fraud: nri victims

On May 10, I received two transaction alerts for cash withdrawals of Rs 20, 000 and Rs. 5, 000. I immediately called up the Bank as soon as I saw the transaction alerts to confirm as my debit card was with me at home and I had not made these transactions. After which I immediately blocked the debit card after speaking to Ankit on the NRI helpline for UAE customers.

The Bank representative (Ankit) on the phone told me that the my debit card has been successfully blocked as well as my Internet banking has been blocked.

After three hours of that I received another two alerts of transactions worth Rs 10, 000 and Rs. 6, 000. I was surprised that these transactions took place as I was told by Ankit that my debit card has been blocked and so was my internet banking.

I called that UAE helpline again and spoke to Imran who told me that the card was still active and that Ankit had probably not blocked the card. I told them to check their call records and check my conversation with Ankit. I was told that someone from the investigation team will call me back within an hour after they check their call records and screen shots.

I was also told to block my NRO account as a precautionary measure – which I did.

I was issued SR[protected] for my NRE account from which money was stolen.

I request the bank management to revert these transactions and restore my account balance which which may restore my faith in your banking system.

I have been banking with your Bank for over 10 years and will be forced to review my relationship with the bank if nothing comes from this request.

Many NRIs like me will also loose faith in the Indian banking system if we continue to be robbed of our hard earned money because of inefficiency in your security systems.

I am a journalist and would certainly raise this issue in the press so that the bank is forced to protect the rights of consumers like me who suffer due to no fault of theirs.