Woman ignores OTP for unauthorised foodpanda orders, still charged small transactions; filed police report 

A member of the public who experienced unauthorised charges by foodpanda despite ignoring the one-time passwords posted a warning on social media, urging others to monitor their bank statements.

“Most of us may overlook some small payments (few dollars up to S$30 per transaction) in our bank statements as not many would do reconciliation on each and every payment,” wrote a Complaint Singapore Facebook page member on Monday (April 4).

However, the concerned individual shared that she received OTP texts on her phone for foodpanda orders she didn’t make.

“Bank said if I don’t share my OTP, then the transaction wouldn’t go through, and I should just ignore the OTP SMS,” she said.

On Monday evening, the bank called the woman to verify the multiple foodpanda transactions allegedly made by her that day.

“I told the caller not to authorise any transaction,” she said, adding she would cancel her card soon after.

After reconciling with the bank, the woman discovered five unauthorised transactions, amounting to about S$120.

The woman filed a police report on the incident and will be forwarding it to the bank and foodpanda for necessary actions.

“I wrote it here, just to share with our readers who don’t do bank reconciliation for own private account on regular basis,” she said, noting that small amounts could be easily missed, especially if by regularly used merchants.

The woman also said that those who receive unwarranted OTP SMSes for any payments should do due diligence and investigate their bank accounts for unauthorised transactions.

She highlighted that the amount stated on the OTP was not the same as the transaction amount and was off by a few cents or up to two dollars. “The timing is off too, by a few hours or a day,” she added.

Members from the online community wondered how the transaction could have been processed when the OTP was disregarded.

Others shared that they too fell victim to such events and urged the public to check their bank accounts daily. /TISG

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