FNB flagged our ***** itself, told us the account was frozen, then let it be drained — R172,500 lost, over a year of silence

On 23 June 2025, Go Big Media (Pty) Ltd paid R172,500 to a supplier, 12 Star Media, based on an invoice that turned out to be a business email compromise **** — the supplier's real banking details had been swapped for a *****ulent FNB account (account number ***, opened in the name "12 Star Media") by ********s who had intercepted our email correspondence.

What makes this worse is that FNB's own ***** team caught the transaction as suspicious the very next day. On 24 June at 15:47, FNB's ***** Risk Management team emailed us questioning the legitimacy of the payment and gave us three business days to respond. We didn't need three days — we rep**** within 27 hours, on 25 June at 18:36, confirming unequivocally that the transaction was *****ulent and attaching the **** invoice as proof.

That same day we opened a ******** case with Klerksdorp SAPS (case number CAS 374/06/2025) and reported the ***** to FNB directly, receiving reference number SAS ***. On 26 June, FNB told us by phone that the receiving account had been frozen.

It hadn't been. Bank statements we later obtained show the ****** funds sat untouched in that account for three days after we reported the ***** — more than enough time for FNB to secure it — before being drained: roughly R8,000 withdrawn in the days immediately after our report, then R55,305.58 in withdrawals and card purchases on 26 June alone, and a further R105,865.83 on 27 June. By the end of that day, almost the entire R172,500 was gone.

Because FNB had not actually frozen anything despite telling us it had, we had no choice but to pay our own attorneys to obtain an urgent interdict from the Klerksdorp Magistrate's Court, served on FNB on 27 June, ordering FNB to freeze the account. This is action FNB should have taken on its own initiative days earlier, on a transaction its own ***** team had already flagged.

What followed was two months of us chasing FNB for answers, and getting almost nothing back. We sent email after email — to the original ***** consultant, then to the colleague the case was handed to when she went quiet, then to both of them together, copying in our attorney for good measure — and made repeated phone calls just to find out who was even handling the case any more. Most of these went completely unanswered. When we did get a reply, it was either a bare apology for "the inconvenience and frustrations caused," or a promise like the one on 11 August ("an update will be shared by the end of the week") that simply never materialised. We had to phone FNB directly more than once just to learn that the case had been reassigned, because nobody had thought to tell us. On 26 August 2025 — more than two months and countless follow-ups after we first reported the ***** — FNB finally offered to release the only money left in the account: R3,273.35, less than 2% of what we lost — on condition that we sign an indemnity. As drafted, that indemnity was broad enough to potentially waive our right to ever hold FNB accountable for the R172,500, not just the leftover balance. We wrote back the next day, 27 August, asking FNB to narrow the wording so it covered only the R3,273.35 and didn't touch our rights regarding the rest of our loss, and followed up again to press for an answer. That was over a year ago. Despite all of these emails and calls, we have had no response from FNB since — to this day.

Throughout this, we did everything asked of us and more: we responded to FNB faster than their own deadline required, opened a police case within a day of being alerted, cooperated fully with the investigating officer, had our IT provider and email host investigate and lock down our systems, spent money on urgent legal action to force FNB to do what it had already told us was done, and chased FNB relentlessly by email and phone for month after month. FNB, on the other hand, identified the ***** itself, misrepresented the status of the account, allowed it to be emptied over three days, went silent for weeks at a time despite our repeated follow-ups, and then, after finally offering back less than 2% of our loss with strings attached, stopped responding to us altogether — a silence that has now lasted more than a year.

We are asking FNB to finally break that silence, take responsibility for its own delay and for misinforming us about the account being frozen, and to properly compensate Go Big Media (Pty) Ltd for the R172,500 lost as a result.