Fraudsters have escaped with tens of thousands of pounds worth of building supplies after seven companies, including some in Bradford, were duped into taking payment from stolen or cloned credit cards.

Now police in Bradford are warning builders’ merchants to be aware of the fraud, believed to be linked to a door delivery scam revealed in the Telegraph & Argus in September.

That involved Leeds-based company Doors2Floors being duped out of thousands of pounds of stock by fraudsters who used a cloned credit card to buy replacement doors and get them delivered to Bradford.

The company tracked down the delivery address and found that it was a derelict house in Silverdale Road, West Bowling.

Police are investigating a series of incidents across West Yorkshire where goods have been ordered through the use of stolen or cloned credit cards with the goods then delivered to the same address on Silverdale Road and accepted by a man who pays in cash for the delivery fee. The details of the other companies have not been released.

Sergeant Mick Cheetham, of the Great and Little Horton Neighbourhood Policing Team, said: “The goods are never seen to go into any particular address and the company involved later discovers the cards are stolen or cloned. Once they have realised that it is not bona fide, and the payment has not gone through, it is often too late.

“There have been seven recent reports of this nature from companies across West Yorkshire, all delivering to this same address.

“We are conducting enquiries to trace those responsible for this scam, however; we want businesses to be aware of this particular tactic.”

Doors2Floors spokesman Ismail Loonat said at the time: “All of these transactions have worked the same way. They have all been collected by a courier from Cookridge. The total works out to around £5,600 within five transactions and if we can’t find this guy we are up to £5,000 out of pocket.

“Apparently the courier used to get paid on time, so never thought it odd, but now thinks it’s odd that he never saw the doors go inside a house, and everything was delivered to the street. It was fine until we got a letter from our credit card company to say that the transactions have been done with a cloned credit card.”

The man seen to receive the material is described as Asian and anyone who can help identify the man should call the non emergency number 101 or Crimestoppers in confidence on 0800 555 111.