Educating clients about fraud awareness and scams was the recent focus of National Customer Service Week for Barclays in the Isle of Man.

As part of the activities, Barclays delivered a seminar on fraud and scam awareness to more than 30 partners and advocates at legal firm Appleby.

This seminar was the latest in a series of presentations by the bank’s fraud manager, Emma Qualtrough, and fraud analyst, Sharon Kinley, on this growing issue which can impact individuals, small businesses and large corporates.

The presentation covered facts and figures about fraud, scams and cyber security issues, case studies of real-life Isle of Man-based fraud incidents and explained key terms such as phishing, vishing, smishing, baiting, social engineering and malware.

Craig Drummond, head of corporate and business banking at Barclays in the Isle of Man, said: ’Our clients and customers are at the heart of everything we do and while we have an ongoing focus on fraud and cyber-crime we wanted to offer a range of sessions during National Customer Service Week to help raise awareness of this issue.

’Our sessions looked at everything from data breaches and how to determine whether your details have been subject to a data breach to what to do if you have been a victim of a scam or fraud and the importance of reporting it to Action Fraud.

’It is great to have the opportunity to share our knowledge on these important topics and we hope our clients and customers found it valuable and they are now armed with information and advice to help keep them and their businesses safe from scams and fraud.’

Tom Brook, partner at Appleby Isle of Man, said: ’Appleby has recently achieved the ISO/IEC 270001 Information Security Management accreditation and this is without question a very important area for us, as it is for all law firms.

’Fraud and scam awareness supports our accreditation, and it was certainly a hot topic in the office after Emma and Sharon’s talk.

’Everyone who attended commented on how useful the talk was, particularly the very stark case studies that outlined recent, realâ??life examples.

’These really highlight the level of vigilance required now as fraud and scam methods become ever more sophisticated, both in the office and in our private lives.’

National Customer Service Week took place earlier this month.

The event was organised by the Institute of Customer Service to raise awareness of the vital role that exceptional customer service plays in successful business practice and the growth of the economy.

This year, Barclays highlighted the effects of fraud, scams and cyber-crime in the community by hosting ’drop-in’ advice sessions for customers in the branch.

The bank’s fraud and scam prevention experts also worked with Isle of Man Victim Support to offer advice along with the Isle of Man Constabulary, the Isle of Man Government Cyber and Information Assurance team, Isle of Man College and the Isle of Man Economic Crime Unit.