Beneath it, despite her claims of receiving chemotherapy for terminal cancer, was a full head of hair which CCTV footage (below) shows a police officer untying, revealing it to be shoulder-length.

The headscarf, like the crutch she used to hobble into the police station, was another part of the deception that netted the fraudster an estimated £1.2 million from unsuspecting clients – and on Friday (3 February) a nine-year jail sentence.

Lyne Barlow Independent Travel was set up in November 2019, and its victims soon began contacting police having been duped by rock-bottom prices. You can hear some of the calls from her despairing clients in the audio clip at the top of this article.

Barlow sold at heavily discounted rates and used new bookings to fund existing holidays in a "Ponzi"-style scheme which she operated during 2019 and into 2020 as the pandemic took hold.

In many cases, she sold customers a holiday that was a much shorter than billed and, in some instances, without return flights – leaving clients stranded. Others only discovered at the airport that they did not have seats, or that their booking had been cancelled because Barlow had not paid for it.

The calls to police grew as word of her practices spread via social media. One caller told Durham Constabulary how he had paid her cash for a holiday to mark his 70th birthday he was unable to take.

The soundbites tell a story of evasion and lies from Barlow, who ducked and dived until the scale of her dishonesty became her undoing.

One voice told how they narrowly avoided being stranded abroad: “I had trouble getting documentation… it was about two days before and then there was a problem with the return flight, I couldn’t get on the flight she said was on my booking confirmation, so I had to stay an extra night.”

The client then booked another holiday with Barlow, but rang the hotel before departure to find there was no reservation.

‘It’s not even booked’

More than a dozen voices tell the same story: “My sister paid her £6,000 for the five of us… there’s been some comments on Facebook that she’s defrauding people.”

“We’d paid in full, so it was £5,520,” said another, with a third adding: “We paid her £1,700, I gave her all my bank details to send it.”

One group paid £4,000 to go to Mexico but called police when no documentation had arrived with only days to go before departure. “I’ve already rang Tui and I’m not on the plane,” said the victim.

Barlow’s fraud was not restricted to overseas travel either, with one caller revealing: “We were driving to Center Parks and got told to pull over because it’s not even booked.”

Another told of how Barlow’s cancer deception had become her main fallback, detailed in email exchanges shared by police. Barlow told clients she was not taking any new bookings because of her condition, which in May 2020 she said had spread to “stage 3/4, it’s in my bones”.

Lockdown also meant she was able to swap dates for clients unable to travel, keeping the cash and not rebooking. One email concerning a Jet2 booking asked whether the holiday – due to take place in four weeks – had been changed. Barlow blamed the operator being short-staffed and then later said “Spanish restrictions” meant she could not contact Jet2. 

Inevitably, thanks mainly to social media, it all unravelled and Barlow, who also defrauded her own family, now faces a nine-year prison sentence.

Detective Sergeant Alan Meehan of Durham Constabulary’s Economic Crime Unit, who led the investigation, said: “She made a conscious and deliberate decision to do what she did. There were points at which she could have put a stop to it all, but she carried on and now she is now paying the price for her actions.”

Durham Constabulary added Barlow’s fraud was among the largest it has ever investigated.