A pensioner has said she is 'disgusted' at having to wait for 16 hours on hold to her bank after she was scammed of £2,800 by online fraudsters.

Eastern Daily Press: Wendy Grady has been scammed out of money which disappeared from her TSB account.Byline: Sonya DuncanCopyright: Archant 2018Wendy Grady has been scammed out of money which disappeared from her TSB account.Byline: Sonya DuncanCopyright: Archant 2018 (Image: Archant 2017)

Former auxiliary nurse Wendy Grady, 66, of Poplar Way, Attleborough, saw the four figure amount had been withdrawn from her TSB account after fraudsters called her on May 20.

The scammers who called her were able to convince her of their legitimacy by telling her details about direct debits from a previous statement, before saying that large sums of money had been taken from her account by someone in Liverpool.

Mrs Grady, who says she has been made to feel 'stupid' by the whole affair, believed the scammers were real TSB staff as they appeared to be calling her from an official TSB line.

In order to cancel these direct debits, she was told to enter a code. Not only had the scammers taken her account into the red by making two separate withdrawals in quick succession of £2,400 and £400, they had also locked Mrs Grady out of the account.

But despite repeated attempts by the pensioner, who used to live in Norwich, over the course of the next three days to recover the stolen funds, she found herself on constant hold as she waited to speak to an operator.

Aside from coping without her pension money for three days while she desperately tried to get through to the bank, the mother-of-two had to support her husband Brian Grady, 75, through the stressful time.

Mr Grady suffers with Parkinson's disease, which also causes him to fall over frequently, and has suffered from strokes in the past.

Mrs Grady said: 'When I was on hold I was very stressed. He knows what I am like. I've never been put into debt before in my life.

'I'm just disgusted with TSB. They have compromised my account, they've breached my confidence and lost my trust.

'The bank are supposed to pay me back in 24 hours.'

In response, TSB said they are reaching out to Mrs Grady to make the situation right.

A TSB spokesman said: 'We're really sorry for the experience Ms Grady has had and the distress and inconvenience this has caused her.

'Meanwhile, our commitment is absolutely clear: no customer will be left out of pocket as a result of the recent IT issues.'