A Metro Bank customer, Zoli Rutter, a businessman from Sussex, has received a refund of £14,244 after his bank account was targeted by fraudsters using the AI chatbot Claude. The scam involved the purchase of credits for the chatbot.
Mr Rutter was paying approximately £15 a month to use Claude for business invoice tracking and analysis. Fraudsters used his Metro Bank debit card, linked to his Anthropic account, to make the payments.
On 19 June, Metro Bank identified a suspicious £90.90 transaction and messaged Mr Rutter. Despite his reply stating he had not authorised it, only that specific transaction was blocked, not his entire account. Fraudulent transactions, ranging from £90 to £200, continued, with many reportedly not blocked by the bank. Metro Bank eventually froze his card the day after the scam began, but by then, over £14,000 had been processed.
A Metro Bank spokesperson stated that due to the “complex nature of the fraud, regretfully some payments were processed” before the card was fully blocked. After an inquiry, Metro Bank temporarily refunded Mr Rutter while seeking a chargeback from Anthropic, the company behind Claude.
Anthropic confirmed that a coordinated gang used Mr Rutter’s cards to buy credits and has banned the user involved. The company stated it has no evidence that the compromised card details originated from its systems and advises anyone affected by fraudulent purchases to contact its support site for a refund. Mr Rutter has since been refunded by Anthropic, and Metro Bank's temporary refund is due to be reversed.
Metro Bank offered Mr Rutter £300 in compensation, acknowledging he had not received the expected service. Mr Rutter intends to complain to the Financial Ombudsman Service. The bank has also stated it has taken steps to prevent delays in card blocking.