Take Five and Stop! Think Fraud: the national campaigns

Take Five to Stop Fraud is the UK's national fraud awareness campaign. It is led by UK Finance, the banking industry body, and backed by His Majesty's Government, with 38 major banks and building societies signed up as of 2025¹. Its message is deliberately simple: take a moment to stop and think before you part with your money or your information, because that pause could keep you safe¹. The campaign exists because the scale of the problem is enormous. Criminals stole £1.3 billion from individuals through banking fraud and scams in 2025, according to industry figures cited by Parliament, of which £703 million was unauthorised and £576 million was authorised⁴.

The campaign's core advice is organised around three words: Stop, Challenge, Protect⁵. Alongside it, the Home Office runs its own campaign, Stop! Think Fraud, carrying the same kind of message to the public⁶. Neither campaign sells anything, endorses anything, or contacts anyone out of the blue. UK Finance states plainly that it would never call or text anyone, especially not to request payments, and that it offers no financial products and gives no endorsement or approval for any products or services⁷. That fact matters, because fraudsters themselves impersonate these campaigns, as the Payment Systems Regulator has warned about its own staff⁸.

Stop, Challenge, Protect: the three-step message

Take Five organises its advice around three steps, and the words are worth knowing because they appear on bank statements screens, in branch posters and in the campaign's materials⁵.

Stop. Take a moment to stop and think before parting with your money or information. It could keep you safe⁵. The point is that fraud almost always depends on speed: the criminal needs a decision made before doubt has time to arrive. Which? describes the same idea as a reliable mantra in the fight against scams: always Take Five and stop to think before you part with any money or share any sensitive details¹¹.

Challenge. Ask yourself, could it be fake? It is ok to reject, refuse or ignore any requests. Only criminals will try to rush or panic you⁵. This step is where the campaign gives permission to be awkward. A genuine organisation will not mind waiting, being called back, or being asked to verify itself. The campaign also advises avoiding clicking links in unexpected emails, texts or social media messages, and instead going directly to the organisation's official website or app using details you trust⁵.

Protect. If you think you have been scammed, contact your bank immediately and report it to the police at reportfraud.police.uk or on 0300 123 2040⁵. The order matters: the bank is the party that can actually try to stop or recall a payment, so it comes first.

The three steps are not a process for investigating a fraud, and they are not a way of checking whether a caller is genuine. They are a habit: a default pause inserted between any unexpected request and any action. The campaign's own summary of its purpose is "providing advice on the steps you can take to Stop, Challenge and Protect when faced with requests for your money or information"¹.

Five rules for protecting your money and information

Alongside the three steps, Take Five sets out five rules, published in its guidance and repeated by banks that back the campaign²:

1. Never disclose security details, such as your PIN or full password. It is never okay to reveal these details.
2. Don't assume an email request or caller is genuine. People aren't always who they say they are.
3. Don't be rushed into a decision. A genuine bank or organisation won't mind waiting to give you time to stop and think.
4. Listen to your instincts. If something feels wrong then it is usually right to pause and question it.
5. Stay in control. Have the confidence to refuse unusual requests for information².

The first rule is absolute because there is no legitimate circumstance in which it is suspended. MoneyHelper's guidance states that your bank, the police and regulators will never ask you to move money to a 'safe' account¹², and Independent Age gives the same rule in a wider form: your bank or the police will never ask for your PIN or password, or ask you to transfer funds for fraud reasons¹³. Any request that breaches one of these rules is not a borderline case. It is the scam itself.

The third and fourth rules work together. Rushing is the mechanism by which the other rules get broken, which is why the campaign treats pressure as a warning sign in its own right. The fifth rule addresses the social difficulty directly: many people comply with fraudsters because refusing feels rude. Take Five's position is that refusing is not rude, it is control².

Warning signs that a contact could be a scam

Take Five lists common warning signs: unexpected contact, pressure to act quickly, requests for personal or security information, offers that seem too good to be true, and payment details that suddenly change⁵. Other official and independent bodies describe the same pattern with slightly different emphasis, and the overlap is where the practical checklist comes from.

The FSCS lists inaccurate spelling and wording, a sense of urgency to act quickly, being asked for bank details or passwords and being told not to tell anyone, and an unfamiliar email address¹⁴. GOV.UK's scam checklist includes pressure to make a decision, a short deadline, threats, the contact being unexpected, requests for personal information like bank details, being told to transfer money, being told you have to pay to apply for something, claims of unclaimed credits, and offers of a discount, refund, rebate or grant¹⁵. Citizens Advice adds being asked to pay in an unusual way, and the absence of written confirmation of what has been agreed¹⁶.

Which? notes that cold calls, emails or texts offering to boost your wealth are a warning sign of an investment scam¹⁷, and its reporting on refund scams found the same test in a simpler form: it is likely to be a scam if an unexpected call or message asks you to react urgently, give personal information, give bank details, give card details or confirm passwords¹⁸.

Pulled together, the signs most bodies agree on are:

• the contact was unexpected
• you are being pressured or given a short deadline
• you are asked for personal, bank or security details
• you are told to keep it secret
• the offer looks too good to be true
• payment details change at the last moment, or the payment method is unusual
• there is no written confirmation, or the company has no verifiable address⁵

A single sign is not proof of a scam, but several together usually are. The dedicated guide to how to spot a scam works through these in more detail.

Impersonation scams: why a known number or name proves nothing

Impersonation is the technique that makes most of the warning signs hard to spot, because the criminal arrives wearing something familiar. Take Five's guidance on impersonation fraud lists the tactics: criminals use 'spoofing' to make numbers or emails look legitimate, pressure you into following their instructions, and say that your bank account is at risk and you need to move your money to a 'safe account'¹⁹.

The technical point is that caller ID and sender names can be faked. Which? explains that scammers use identity masking technology to change the name displayed as the sender, known as 'number spoofing', so a text can appear in a genuine message thread from your bank²⁰. Age UK gives the same warning for calls: scammers can mimic an official telephone number, which can trick you into thinking the caller is from a legitimate organisation such as a bank or utility company²¹.

This is why the campaigns insist that a known number or name proves nothing. Take Five's advice is that if you receive a call from someone claiming to be from a trusted organisation, you hang up and call them back on a number you know to be correct¹⁹. Its courier fraud guidance adds a specific route: hang up, Take Five, and contact your bank securely, using a number you know is genuine or by calling 159²². The guide to checking your bank is really contacting you covers the practical ways to do this, and 159: the number to call your bank about a scam explains that service.

The same logic applies to the campaigns themselves. UK Finance states it would never call or text anyone, especially not to request payments⁷, and Take Five states it will never text or call you and ask you to share your information or transfer money¹. NS&I, a government-backed savings provider, gives its customers the same assurance and the same instruction: contact your bank immediately if you think you have fallen for a scam, and report it²³. The Payment Systems Regulator has even warned consumers about fraudsters posing as its own employees, and advises victims to contact the police reporting service and call their bank immediately so the bank can protect the account⁸. No genuine body in this list will ever be offended at being verified.

Scam types the campaigns cover

Take Five maintains an A to Z of scams on its website, which lists the types it covers⁵:

A few of these have their own dedicated campaign guidance. On ticket scams, Take Five advises that if you think you have paid for a fake ticket or shared your financial information with a criminal, you contact your bank immediately²⁴. On romance fraud, its advice to anyone who thinks they are being targeted is to contact your bank, because they are there to help²⁵. On holiday fraud, the instruction is the same: contact your bank immediately and report it to the police²⁶.

The A to Z is worth browsing precisely because the list is wider than most people expect. Conveyancing scams, for example, target people in the middle of buying a house, a moment when large transfers are normal and a changed bank detail can slip through. Invoice and mandate scams work the same way in a business or trades context. The site's guide to changed bank details on an invoice covers that pattern, and romance scams, identity theft and phishing each have their own pages here.

Stop! Think Fraud: the Home Office campaign

Stop! Think Fraud is a campaign from the Home Office⁶. It sits alongside Take Five rather than replacing it, and carries the same underlying message to a general audience: pause before acting on any unexpected request for money or information.

The government also runs targeted warnings through the same channels. When student finance payments approach, for example, the government has urged students to stay alert for scams, using the Stop! Think Fraud campaign to reach them⁶. This pattern, a single national campaign name applied to seasonal and audience-specific warnings, is how the campaign operates: it is an awareness brand rather than a reporting route or a service.

For a consumer, the practical content of the two campaigns overlaps heavily. Both tell you to stop and think, both warn against urgency and unexpected requests, and both point victims towards their bank and the police. The existence of two campaign names is a result of two different public bodies, UK Finance and the Home Office, running awareness work, not a sign of conflicting advice¹.

If you think you have been scammed: bank first, then report

The bodies in this field give the same two-step instruction, and the order is consistent. Take Five: if you think you have been scammed, contact your bank immediately and report it to the police at reportfraud.police.uk or on 0300 123 2040⁵. The Payment Systems Regulator tells victims to contact their bank immediately to report it as soon as they realise they have fallen victim to a scam²⁷. Which? adds a detail worth noting: call your bank using the number on the back of your bank card, and report it to Report Fraud, formerly known as Action Fraud²⁸.

The Financial Ombudsman Service sets out the immediate steps it expects of a victim:

1. Contact your bank or payment services provider immediately.
2. Contact the police on 101.
3. Report the scam to Report Fraud.
4. Keep records of all contact and correspondence between you and the scammer²⁹.

Reporting to the police differs by nation. The Information Commissioner's Office, which handles nuisance call complaints, refers fraud complaints to Report Fraud in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, and to Police Scotland in Scotland³⁰. Report Fraud is the police's fraud-reporting service for the rest of the UK, reachable at www.reportfraud.police.uk or on 0300 123 2040³¹, and the government confirms that if you believe you are a victim of fraud, you can make a report to Report Fraud³³.

Two further points from the guidance. First, keep records: the ombudsman's list makes correspondence with the scammer part of the evidence a bank complaint may later rely on²⁹. Second, be alert to what follows. Which? has reported on recovery scams, where fraudsters target recent scam victims: between November 2024 and November 2025, Action Fraud received 5,553 reports related to recovery scams, resulting in further losses³⁴. Any later offer to recover the money, especially one asking for a fee, is the same kind of approach as the original fraud and is treated with the same suspicion in the guidance. The guide to recovery room scams and the page on whether to pay a firm to recover money lost to a scam cover this.

If your bank refuses a refund, the route after that is a complaint and then the Financial Ombudsman Service, which handles complaints involving fraud, scams, unauthorised payments and identity theft²⁹. The pages on complaining to your bank about a scam refund and taking a refused scam refund to the ombudsman set out that process, and first steps for victims gathers the immediate actions in one place.

The Banking Protocol: when branch staff call the police

The Banking Protocol is a UK-wide initiative through which branch staff can alert the police to suspected scams³⁵. Under the scheme, branch staff are trained to detect the warning signs that someone is being scammed and make an emergency call to the police¹⁰. The Scottish Government's factsheet on scam prevention describes the scheme in the same terms, as part of the Take Five to Stop Fraud campaign's Stop, Challenge, Protect approach¹⁰.

The scheme has since been extended: anti-fraud measures used by bank staff to protect scam victims in branches have been extended to telephone and online banking³⁵. For a consumer, this is why a bank may question a payment, delay it, or ask seemingly intrusive questions at the counter or on the phone. Staff intervention is not an accusation; it is the Protocol working as designed, and it has been a route by which payments in progress have been interrupted before the money leaves.

Fraud losses: £1.3 billion and how much is paid back

The headline figure for 2025 is that criminals stole £1.3 billion from individuals through banking fraud and scams, according to industry figures cited by the House of Commons Library, of which £703 million was unauthorised and £576 million was authorised⁴. UK Finance's own fraud report gives the total as £1.28 billion of gross losses across unauthorised and authorised fraud in 2025, up 4%⁹. Both figures cover the same losses for the same year, so the difference between them is one of rounding and presentation rather than substance.

The industry also prevents a great deal. UK Finance reports that the industry prevented a further £1.68 billion of unauthorised fraud in 2025, equivalent to 70p in every £1 of attempted fraud⁹. Within the totals, some categories fell sharply: telephone banking fraud losses were £7.9 million in 2025, down 53% on 2024⁹, and losses from CEO scams, where a fraudster impersonates a senior figure to push an urgent payment, fell 51% to £1.1 million returned to victims⁹.

How much is paid back depends on the type of fraud. The distinction between unauthorised and authorised payments is the one that matters for refunds, and it is covered in how refund rights differ. For authorised push payment scams, where the victim was tricked into making the payment themselves, the Payment Systems Regulator reported a 61% reimbursement rate on personal accounts in 2024, as recorded by UK Finance³⁶. The rules that now govern those refunds are explained in authorised push payment reimbursement, including the maximum refund and the £100 excess.

Fraud reaches well beyond banking. The Pensions Regulator chairs the Pension Scams Action Group, and reports that independent trustees appointed to the schemes it has dealt with have received initial compensation payments of £13.2 million from the Fraud Compensation Fund³⁷. In the benefits system, official statistics show 3.3% (£9.5 billion) of total benefit expenditure was overpaid due to fraud and error in Great Britain in the financial year ending 2025³⁸. These figures are a reminder that the Take Five message, stop and think before parting with money or information, applies to contact about pensions and benefits just as much as to banking.

Who runs Take Five, and what it does not do

Take Five is a national campaign led by UK Finance and backed by His Majesty's Government². UK Finance describes the campaign as offering straightforward and impartial advice to help everyone protect themselves from preventable financial fraud². The Building Societies Association, whose members include many of the building societies among the 38 signatories, describes Take Five as a national awareness campaign led by FFA UK, part of UK Finance³⁹. The campaign's website is takefive-stopfraud.org.uk².

What Take Five does not do matters as much as what it does. It does not endorse any products or services, and it will never text or call you asking you to share your information or transfer money¹. UK Finance, which leads it, offers no financial products and provides no endorsement or approval for any products or services⁷. Neither campaign investigates individual frauds, holds money, or issues refunds; those are jobs for banks, the police and the ombudsman.

This absence of products is not incidental. A campaign that sold or endorsed nothing cannot be used as a hook for a sales pitch, and any message that claims otherwise, a caller citing Take Five to legitimise a request, a text using its name to introduce a link, is borrowing trust that was never theirs to use. The campaign's own answer to that is the same as its core message: stop, challenge, and if in doubt, contact the organisation directly on a number you know is genuine⁵.

For wider help, Age UK publishes an avoiding scams guide covering what a scam is, the different types, ways to avoid being scammed, what to do if you have been scammed, and useful contact information⁴⁰, and its support for scam victims page explains where to report, including by calling 0300 123 2040 or visiting www.reportfraud.police.uk³². Independent Age and MoneyHelper both publish free guidance on scam types and avoidance¹². The scams and fraud section of this site gathers all of the specific topics, from safe account scams to forwarding suspicious texts to 7726.