What to do if you have been scammed: a recovery playbook

If it has happened, hear this first: it happens to sharp, careful people, and shame is the scammer's last weapon. Silence and delay protect them. Speed protects you. What decides outcomes is what happens in the first seventy-two hours, so move in this order.

Step one: freeze the evidence. Screenshot the advert, the chats, the call logs, the profile pictures, every receipt and transfer alert. Record the account numbers, account names, phone numbers, and every name or office mentioned. Then write a timeline while memory is fresh: dates, amounts, promises, meeting points. Evidence degrades fastest in the first week.

Do not delete the chat thread, even when it stings to look at. And resist the urge to lead with threats: preserve first, confront later, with copies in hand.

Step two: call your bank immediately. Report the transfer as fraudulent and request a recall to the receiving bank. Report the receiving account number to that bank's own fraud desk as well. Recalls are not promises, and freezes typically require court process, but early alerts raise the odds that money is still sitting where it can be held.

Step three: report properly, on paper. File a report with the Police, and where the fraud involved impersonation, forged documents or advance-fee tactics, petition the EFCC: advance-fee and property fraud sit squarely in their mandate. Your petition should carry your timeline, the evidence bundle, the account numbers and names, and a clear statement of the total amount. Keep certified copies of everything you submit. If the matter crossed state lines or involved forged government documents, say so plainly; it shapes how the case is handled.

Step four: consider civil recovery. A lawyer's letter of demand sometimes shakes loose money that had 'disappeared'. Beyond that, an action to recover money paid for a failed consideration is the usual route, and where the amount qualifies, the small-claims track moves faster and costs less. A frank lawyer will also tell you when the numbers do not justify the fight. That honesty is worth paying for.

Step five: warn others, factually. Report the account and phone number everywhere they appeared: the platform hosting the advert, the banks involved, and neighbourhood or professional groups. Patterns only become visible when people speak.

Now the honest part. Recovery is possible but not certain, and anyone who promises your full money back in days, for an upfront 'processing fee', is running the same hustle in a new costume. Treat the official channels as the real path, keep your copies, and be patient with the timeline.

Then rebuild the habit that fails most people: verify before money, never after. Confirm title at the lands registry, match every account name to documents, view in daylight, and keep the seven defensive questions close; our full guide on how to avoid property scams in Nigeria gathers them in one place.

On Xavorian, that order is enforced by design: listings publish only after identity, liveness, bank-name match, document and automated-verification gates, and payments route to name-matched verified accounts. Verification-first browsing cannot rewrite what already happened. It can make your next search begin from a pool that has already been screened.

One last thing. Report even when the amount feels 'too small'. The ₦10,000 inspection fee is the scammer's bread and butter, and a paper trail across fifty small reports is often how one large case finally stands up.