$166.8 million.

That’s the amount Australians reported losing to payment redirection scams in 2025, up 9.3% on the year before, according to the National Anti-Scam Centre [1].

The scam is simple. A fraudster gets into a supplier's email account, or impersonates the supplier by email, and sends a believable request: our bank details have changed, please update them before the next payment. The invoice is genuine and the amount is right. Only the account number is wrong.

That's why it slips through. Approvers check the purchase, and nothing about the purchase is wrong. Accounts payable updates the vendor record, the payment run goes out, and nobody notices until the real supplier asks why they haven't been paid. By then the money has usually been moved on, and getting it back is unlikely.

$166.8 million is only the reported loss not the full cost. Losses that go unreported never enter the figures. For finance teams, the window to act is before the payment leaves not when the real supplier calls.

RedOwl checks for fraud at every stage of invoice validation not just when a bank detail change is requested.

If one of your suppliers' bank details changed this week, who would notice before the next payment run?

Catch payment fraud before you pay → Book a demo

References

  1. National Anti-Scam Centre (ACCC). Targeting scams: report of the National Anti-Scam Centre on scams data and activity 2025. March 2026. Read the report (PDF)