Will my bank like AIB or Bank Of Ireland give me money back if I'm caught out by an 083 scam?
Sign up to our FREE newsletter to make sure you don't miss a beat Invalid Email Something went wrong, please try again later. Sign up! Thank you for subscribing We have more newsletters Show me See our privacy notice  Irish phone holders have been the victim of a major increase in scam calls over the last few months with the fraudsters using local mobile numbers to catch people out. They have been calling off 083, 085, and 087 mobile numbers, and are pretending to be from the Department of Social Protection among other government agencies - often asking you to pay a fine. Tech-savvy generations know better than to respond to the voice messages playing out or even to answer the calls in the first place, but many people who are less aware of the scam are being conned out of money at a fierce rate, according to authorities. Should you be one of the people who has authorised payment in relation to this scam, you may be able to get your money back from your Irish bank, depending on what happened and how you paid these criminals. Money can only be taken from your account if you authorise the transaction, so if you notice an unauthorised transaction on your account, you should contact your bank immediately. In most circumstances of fraud, your bank has to refund you the money - particularly if it was an unauthorised payment. According to Citizens Information, you can ask your bank or credit card provider to reverse the transaction through a process known as chargeback. If the money was sent by bank transfer it will make it very difficult to trace where the money has gone to, but the faster you report an incident of this nature, the more chance you have of getting it back. There are some circumstances where its a lot less likely you will get your money back; these include if you have sent a sum of money through a wire service such as MoneyGram, PayPoint, or Western Union. As well as this, it is unlikely you will get your money back if you used vouchers or gift cards to pay the scammer. Gardai continue to issue warnings to the public over these ongoing calls, and have confirmed that: Personnel from the Department of Social Protection will never contact you through calls or text asking for your personal information.