The 93-year-old victim of a distraction theft has had the £23,000 stolen from him refunded by his bank.
The man was doing his banking at an ATM in the NatWest branch in St Peter's Hill in Grantham, Lincolnshire, earlier this month when he was targeted by three men.
In a carefully-timed swoop by the thieves, the victim was distracted by one of the men, as another obtained the pensioner's PIN number and switched his bank card as it came out the machine.
It was days later when the man tried to use his cards that the theft was uncovered and reported to police.
Officers from Lincolnshire Police said the victim's cash was withdrawn from the account hours after the theft at about 2.55pm on December 14.
Today, the bank said it had refunded the pensioner's money adding the elderly man had been the victim of "callous" thieves.
A spokeswoman for NatWest said: "Unfortunately our customer fell victim to a callous distraction technique whilst using an ATM.
"We have refunded all the money to the customer and continue to do everything we can to help the police identify the criminals.
"The safety and security of our customers is of utmost importance to us."
Detectives, who released CCTV of the incident in a bid to trace the culprits, said the theft had been well organised and those involved had carefully selected their victim before striking.
Anyone with information is urged to contact the police by calling 101.