30th October 2026 – (Hong Kong) A new loan-pitch scam circulating online has fraudsters posing as Bank of China (Hong Kong) staff, cold-calling residents with cut-rate credit offers before switching to blue-tick WhatsApp business accounts and sending forged staff cards — a trap one citizen nearly walked into before checking the Sheung Wan branch and reporting the matter in time, with no money lost.
Mr Wu, who shared his near-miss on social media and later spoke about the episode, said he first took a call from someone claiming to be a BOCHK officer offering a loan at just 0.18 per cent interest. He was then contacted on WhatsApp by a verified-looking business account whose display name and avatar used the bank’s branding and the words “BOC Hong Kong”.
The callers asked for his identity card, three months of income statements, proof of address and even shareholding records, claiming the papers would help secure a still lower rate. Unaware of the ruse, Wu sent the documents as instructed. In a voice note he was told to move all his cash deposits into a BOCHK account before signing, with the promise that putting more money in could unlock half a year interest-free — framed as a “repayment stress test”.
After days of contact, the impostors booked him to “sign” this morning and told him to watch his mobile. Wu assumed he needed to appear in person at the Sheung Wan branch named on their card and arrived on time. The WhatsApp contact then snapped that a colleague had not yet reached him, so turning up was useless, and said a few steps still had to be finished on their “hotline” before any branch signing.
Wu instead asked real bank staff on site. They confirmed the Sheung Wan branch had no employee matching the card’s Chu surname and urged him to report the matter to police. When he told the scammer that BOCHK colleagues were already preparing a report and contacting the police station, the other side still tried to deflect, claiming a colleague had called and he had not picked up.
The forged bilingual card carried the BOCHK logo and styled the holder as “approval department manager (branch)” Chu, with an address at the Tung Hip Commercial Building branch in Sheung Wan. Closer inspection showed glaring tells: the bank has no such approval department; traditional and simplified Chinese were mixed on a card that Hong Kong banks normally print in traditional characters only; and there was no personal mobile number, only a branch direct line.
Wu later filed a police report and posted his case number, sighing that “recent scams are getting more and more realistic”. He said he had been at the station for less than 10 minutes when an elderly woman walked in saying she had already lost money to a fake Bank of China scam — a glimpse, he felt, of how brazen the racket has become.
Police said they received a report today from a resident contacted by someone claiming to be BOCHK staff, offering a low-interest loan and arranging an online signing. The complainant found the approach suspicious and reported it; no money was lost in that case either. Officers and genuine bank staff continue to urge the public never to send identity or financial papers, or move cash on a stranger’s say-so, after an unsolicited loan call.
 staff, cold-calling residents with cut-rate credit offers before switching to blue-tick WhatsApp business accounts and sending forged staff cards.){kind=link}