A Penticton strata is out $3,554 after being tricked by an email scam.
According to a Feb. 14 Civil Resolution Tribunal (CRT) decision, the owners of a condo building on Wade Avenue hired LimitlessEV Enterprise in 麻豆精选 to install an electric vehicle charger in July 2023. Limitless sent the strata an invoice for the $3,554.78 deposit, offering an e-transfer as a payment option. The invoice also warned about suspicious emails and to call the company before sending any money.
The strata manager emailed the provided address to confirm the payment method and received a reply asking them to send the payment to a different email account. According to the CRT, the reply included unusual spacing, punctuation, and capitalization. The strata manager proceeded with the payment. It was later determined that the new email address belonged to a scammer, not Limitless.
The strata argued that the company was negligent for using an insecure email address and asked for their deposit to be reimbursed. The strata did pay the deposit by cheque on Aug. 7 and successfully e-transferred the final invoice amount on Sept.18.
In its decision, the CRT leaned heavily on a BC Supreme Court ruling that said if two parties are defrauded, the one who made it easier for the fraudster should bear the loss. In this case, the tribunal found that the strata manager ignored red flags, such as suspicious emails and the request to use a different email address. The tribunal also pointed out that the original invoice had clear instructions to call the company if something seemed off 鈥� instructions that the strata didn鈥檛 follow.
While noting that Limitless鈥檚 email was hacked, the CRT pointed out that it doesn鈥檛 automatically mean the company was negligent. There was no solid evidence that the company鈥檚 practices were unsafe or careless, the decision stated.
The CRT ruled against the strata, dismissing its claim to be reimbursed for the misdirected e-transfer deposit.
