BANKS have been slammed for automatically blaming scam victims when money has been lost to fraudsters.

The Financial Ombudsman has warned the industry that it's "not fair" to claim that a customer has been "grossly negligent" just because they've fallen for a scam.

Customers were conned out of nearly £240million last year but only a quarter of that was actually refunded.

Banks have to refund cash stolen when a transfer is made without their authorisation.

The ombudsman claims that the firms often shift the blame on customers who may have handed over personal details which has allowed the fraud to happen so they don't have to pay out.

But crooks are using more sophisticated measures making a scam harder to spot, like masking their phone number to make it look like they're calling from the bank.

Text messages from scammers even appear in existing threads from the bank.

The con-men then trick customers into handing over details like verification codes.

Some customers have even fallen victim to the sim swap scam where they convince your mobile firm to activate a new sim card giving fraudsters control of your mobile number.

The crooks are then able to reset your mobile banking passwords and transfer money out of your account.

Now, the Financial Ombudsman, which resolves customer complaints, said that banks should take into account how convincing scams have become - and not simply assume that their customers were "grossly negligent".

Caroline Wayman from the FOS said: "It's not fair to automatically call a customer grossly negligent simply because they've fallen for a scam.

"That's especially true in light of the sophisticated way criminals exploit banks' security systems - and convince customers that their money is at risk.

"We often remind banks that they need to support what they're saying with facts. And if they can't do that, it's likely we'll tell them to cover the money their customer has lost."

Katy Worobec, managing director of economic crime at UK Finance which represents high street banks, said: "Banks will always make every effort to help a customer recover any stolen funds and the industry has introduced new standards on how banks respond to scam victims.

"At the same time our Take Five to Stop Fraud campaign is giving people the knowledge they need to stay safe and we are working with the Joint Fraud Taskforce to deter and disrupt the criminals responsible for these scams."

Shoppers have been warned not to fall for gift card fraud as new figures reveal that £6.5million was lost to scammers to this type of fraud between 1 April 2015 and 31 March 2018.

Here's why using the hotel wifi to check your bank account could actually be putting your cash at risk.

Natwest customers are being warned not to fall for fake emails claiming to be from the bank which trick you into handing over your personal details.