Fraudsters are offering postal workers up to £1,000 a week to intercept and steal bank cards.
Online adverts promise cash to tempt staff into snatching letters containing credit cards and PIN numbers, an investigation found.
An undercover reporter posing as a postman met with one man who offered him money to take bank cards fraudulently obtained in the names of people on his rounds.
The criminal claimed to have ‘been in the game for 30 years’ and to work with a ‘number of postmen’, including in Coventry and London.
An undercover investigation revealed fraudsters are offering postal workers up to £1,000 a week to intercept and steal bank cards
More than 11,000 people in the UK were victims of this type of fraud last year, in which bank cards are stolen in transit, according to UK Finance.
BBC journalist Jonathan Gibson responded to an advert on Craigslist – the controversial online classifieds site – offering £1,000 a week to intercept letters. It said: ‘I need postman ASAP. Make some money if you are a postman.’
He met with a member of the gang outside a bus station in Lewisham, south-east London, who explained the gang illegally signed up for bank accounts in the names of people on the rounds of postmen working for them.
Because the cards were applied for without the customer’s knowledge, they will not know they have been taken.
The fraudster told the secretly filmed meeting for BBC Inside Out: ‘We’re going to tell you, for example, that Ms *****, she’s going to have a letter from NatWest. Any letters from NatWest for Ms *****, intercept.
‘As simple as that. If you open up a new account you’re going to get your card and you’re going to get your PIN, right? Two letters, that’s all it is. You intercept the letters, bring them back to us, you get paid.’
UK Finance says the number of cards stolen in transit has risen every year since 2014, with 11,377 cases recorded last year
On their second meeting in a south London park, the undercover journalist confronted the gang member, who ran away when asked about his alleged crimes. Royal Mail said it had no evidence any staff were involved and said theft of mail was rare but the findings will cause concern for customers.
The firm would not comment on how many of its workers had been prosecuted for stealing mail since it was privatised in 2013. Figures show 1,759 Royal Mail workers were convicted of theft between 2007 and 2011.
UK Finance – which represents almost 300 banks and finance firms – says the number of cards stolen in transit has risen each year since 2014. Last year, there were 11,377 cases, costing card issuers £12.5million.
The body is now investigating. Katy Worobec, head of fraud detection at UK Finance, told the BBC: ‘We do have our own police unit and they target organised criminality.
‘We’ve got a very good relationship with Royal Mail to help target these types of gangs and we’ve seen some good successes in the past.’
A Royal Mail spokesman said: ‘We take all instances of fraud – alleged or actual – very seriously. Our security team is reviewing the programme’s findings as a matter of urgency and will continue our close and ongoing co-operation with the relevant law enforcement agency.
‘The overwhelming majority of postmen and women do all they can to protect the mail and deliver it safely.
‘The business operates a zero-tolerance approach to any dishonesty. We prosecute anyone we believe has committed a crime.’