Protect Your Identity with Norwich and Peterborough Building Society

£1.2 billion was lost to identity theft and credit card fraud in 2008*. N&P (Norwich and Peterborough Building Society) is offering a new ‘PrivacyGuard’ product to help protect its customers from becoming a victim of this crime.

Identity theft is when your personal details have been stolen, such as your name, date of birth, current or previous addresses, bank card details. Your details are then used to obtain goods and services, or open accounts, by deception in your name. Worse still, if the theft goes unnoticed it can impact your own credit record – even if it’s not your fault.

N&P is introducing PrivacyGuard as part of its customer promise to help people ‘be on top of money’. The identity theft protection policy and fraud support service is operated by Affinion International, and is designed to offer peace of mind and assurance to N&P customers. It offers policy holders:

Credit monitoring – whenever someone has searched or viewed your credit report, or if something changes on it, you’ll be alerted
Credit reporting – receive unlimited up-to-date credit reports so you’re always informed of your credit status
Credit score – receive a credit score based on information held about you. It will show you how to read and analyse it, and the things you can do to enhance your rating
Victim-of-fraud resolution – you’ll be assigned a dedicated victim-of-fraud specialist to advise you and act on your behalf should the worst happen
Identity insurance – up to £10,000 towards legal expenses that may be incurred while repairing your credit profile, should you become a victim of identity fraud
Dedicated helpline – comprehensive advice and support with answers to all of your questions relating to protecting your personal data

PrivacyGuard offers a 30 day trial for £1 to allow customers to access and review the benefits on a trial basis before the first payment is taken. After this, the cost is £6.99 per month.

Ewan Edwards, head of marketing at N&P, said: “Identity theft is on the up - between January and December 2008 there were over 200,000 fraud cases identified by CIFAS (the UK’s fraud prevention service), up nearly 15% on the previous year. PrivacyGuard offers our customers the opportunity to protect their identity, and we’re expecting it to be a very popular product.”

David Palmer, managing director of Affinion International, the creator of the PrivacyGuard programme, added: “For nearly 20 years, PrivacyGuard has been a leader in providing consumers with practical tools in defending themselves against incidents of identity theft, preserving both their financial assets and credit profiles in the process. We commend N&P for raising awareness of this crime to its customers and providing them with a means of practical defence.”