Sell property online · screen 5 of 5
Payment redirection scams and the official checks
A payment redirection scam is an email that looks as if it comes from someone you are already dealing with, asking for an expected payment to go to new bank details. Scamwatch says these scams can apply to any high-value business transaction, and in January 2016 Victoria’s legal regulator warned of scammers intercepting emails between clients and their solicitors just before a large payment was due.
General information, not legal or financial advice. The official places to check are Scamwatch and, for a payment already made, your own bank; ID Support NSW explains impersonation scams.
How it reaches a sale
The thread. The email may sit in the same message thread as the last real exchange with the business. In the case Victoria’s regulator described in January 2016, scammers had intercepted emails between clients and their solicitors.
The look. “Scammers can also copy business logos and ABNs, making the scams even harder to spot.”
The request. A payment the reader was expecting, possibly from a business they have been dealing with, now going somewhere else. ID Support NSW describes the same pattern as business email compromise: convincing emails, posing as company leaders or trusted partners, asking for payment or sensitive information.
The timing. “Just before a large payment was due to be made.”
When it issued its warning in January 2016, Victoria’s regulator said it had not yet found the same fraud among Victorian clients but judged the likelihood of it reaching Victorians to be high, and asked law firms to anticipate clients being tricked into sending trust money to thieves by mistake. Scamwatch calls the payment redirection scam one of the most common scams affecting Australian businesses and their customers.
The official checks
Scamwatch’s check follows in its own order, its first step in plain words and the next two word for word.
Victoria’s Legal Services Commissioner
What the Commissioner’s consumer alert of 7 January 2016 on email and internet scams advises, in short:
Pause before opening any link or attachment from someone you were not expecting to hear from.
If an email changes the bank account you are about to pay at the last minute, phone the sender to check. Use a number you already had for them, never one from the suspicious email, which may belong to the scammer. You could also send a small amount first and ring your contact to confirm it arrived.
Before paying a business online, confirm who you are dealing with by typing the business’s published web address into your browser yourself.
Guard your email account against malware and phishing aimed at changing your details or moving money unlawfully, using strong passwords, a firewall, and anti-virus and anti-spyware software.
Read the Commissioner’s warning on the Victorian Legal Services Board + Commissioner site.
Scamwatch
Scamwatch’s first step is to stop and take the time to call the business you are dealing with.
“Now, double check the payment details are correct by using the contact details you found from the business' official website or secure app.”
“Don't use the contact details in the email as they might have been changed by the scammer.”
Scamwatch’s page on business email compromise scams sets these lines in their full context.
What the regulators tell agents
Consumer Protection WA asks agents replying to an email to type in the known genuine address from the agency’s files instead of pressing ‘reply’, because a message can carry a hidden address. Queensland reminds property agents to make sure every party to a real estate contract is who they claim to be.
The same trick reaches the owner’s side of a property. Queensland’s Office of Fair Trading warns agents that someone may pretend to own a rented-out property and ask for the owner’s contact and banking details to be changed. It says these scams have become increasingly common, and that the true owner sometimes does not notice for many months.
A call can carry the scam as well as an email. ID Support NSW says scammers can pose as your bank by phone or text, and may urge you to move funds to another account to protect them from suspected fraud.
Some scams turn the direction round. Consumer Protection WA describes a bogus overseas buyer whose deposit is later reversed after the seller has sent back an ‘overpayment’, and says there should be no reason for a seller to pay money out on a buyer’s behalf. The listing screen, price in an online listing, sets that scam out in full.
Others borrow a government name. ID Support NSW says criminals impersonate government agencies, regulators and law enforcement, and that it knows of scams using Revenue NSW and Service NSW branding. NSW Fair Trading says the state’s new property and stock agents laws, some of which started on 29 June 2026, make it an offence to pretend to be a Fair Trading officer; the most a court can impose for it is $110,000.
If it has happened
“Act quickly if you suspect you've been scammed. Cut ties with the scammer and call your bank immediately to stop any further losses.”
“And report scams to Scamwatch. Your report will help us to protect others.”
ID Support NSW points the same way: “To report a scam or get further information on this type of scam, visit Scamwatch.”
The screens before this one show where the earlier scams sit: the identity fraud in proving who you are and the settlement itself in electronic settlement, state by state.