ATM Dispute

rochfordpeople

We are hoping someone on here will be able to help us! At the end of last month I tried to withdraw £300 from an RBS machine, at Tesco, from a Barclays account. It told me to take my cash, which didn't come out. The machine then went out of service.

Obviously called Barclays, who after many calls told us they had filed a dispute with tesco, who had 12 working days to respond. Last week I called them and they said it was resolved and would go into the account within 4 working days.

I called again today and they now say Tesco have said the machines were working fine on that day and we will not have our money refunded. And also to contact tesco ourselves!

I called back again later and was told they will open a new disute for us, so they now have another 12 working days to respond. If they say no again we can contact the ombudsman.

So what we want to know is how on earth can they be saying this? Clearly their machine must record how much money was put in that machine, and how much came out or was left at the end of the day. Also, that it went out of service straight after the transaction.

Barclays apparently cannot contact their own atm dispute team to see what info they are asking tesco for, or even why they are contacting tesco when it is an rbs machine.

Is there a way we can request this information ourselves, or who we would contact. We have tried RBS today, who basically say that they have no records of atm transactions, which is obviously untrue , and there is no department for us to speak to.

We are waiting for a call back on monday from the tesco store manager who may at leats be able to tell us who runs the cash machines.

We have obviously filed a complaint, which again should have been dealt with by this week which has been put on hole til 21st May. I have drafted a letter requesting information but don't really hold out much hope.

Does anyone have any idea on who to contact and what to do?

Thanks

willo65

You have to go throught your own bank for ATM disputes.

rochfordpeople

But thats the problem. We have been through Barclays (our own bank). They contacted tesco. Tesco say the machine was fine.

Barclays are not telling us what information has been checked, and I was even told today that I have to sort it myself, although another person told me later that I didn't. But this was the same person who told me they could not contact their own ATM dispute, or what tesco had told them.

Feel like i'm banging my head against a brick wall and paying £300 for the privilege

Extant

As for who is responsible, it appears that RBS operates the back-end of their ATM networks, as Tesco are not a clearing bank etc. However, it seems that Tesco Personal Finance are responsible for the day-to-day of the ATMs, and employ someone as Head of ATMs. They are also identified as separate entities by the LINK network (that runs the computer network ATMs use), so that'd be why it was disputed with Tesco.

And yes, the ATM will record what it holds, what each transaction is, etc. Each machine will likely also be balanced at least once a month, which is why they're no doubt saying no - they don't think any money is missing, and the machine didn't think there was a problem with your transaction.

In terms of requesting the information from TPF/RBS - I doubt you'd get very far. It'd be a lot of effort to retrieve that information, and they're not really obliged to - the ATM will have recorded your card number, which is issued by your bank and belongs to your bank. So it's not your personal information. On top of that, they're not obliged to provide any information beyond that, either - i.e. if the machine then went out of service and why.

Extant

rochfordpeople wrote: »

Barclays are not telling us what information has been checked, and I was even told today that I have to sort it myself, although another person told me later that I didn't. But this was the same person who told me they could not contact their own ATM dispute, or what tesco had told them.

ATM disputes are, by and large, electronic - the branch would have filled out a form online, and sent it off. There's no team that deals with them directly so that you could speak to them - and even if there were, it wouldn't be a customer facing role, realistically.

The information that an ATM dispute consists of is basically what time, where, how much did you ask for, how much did you receive, etc. The receiving bank then checks if their ATM balanced, if the machine had an error record etc. It's fairly standard across all disputes.

rochfordpeople

Thank you for your response!

Why would they say that there wasn't a problem though, when I know 100% that there was? If they are only checked once a month, would they know when a problem occured?

valleyviewchris

[FONT=&quot]I guess that this is a wide scale problem and amounts to somewhat less than scrupulous behaviour by the ATM companies. I tried to withdraw £200 from a Link machine at Tescos last month. The machine returned my card but only £40 of the requested amount. No receipt was given. I shrugged and assumed the machine had run out of money and reported the error to customer services in the store. I assumed that my account would have been debited for only £40 but on returning home thought I would check with my bank (Lloyds) only to discover that my account had been debited for £200. There must be many people who would not have bothered to check their accounts particularly where smaller amounts are involved. Yes, like you I have had to take this up with my bank and fill in the claims forms. I have been told that it will take at least a month to investigate. Having read other threads on this subject I am not altogether confident about getting my £160 back. We hear a lot about crooks cloning cards and using ATMs fraudulently but don’t tell me that the companies aren’t aware of this. They could bring in procedures to eliminate it. Does the machine really not know how much money was dispensed for every request? Do all ATMs have cctv? Why don’t the machines show a notice on screen automatically if it is faulty or has run out of cash? If as in my case an error was reported why was the machine not immediately closed or made unavailable to other customers? There are many more questions I could add. For some people the loss, even temporarily of £160 is a very serious matter. I suspect I now know why so many ATMs can afford to allow free withdrawals.[/FONT]

rb10

valleyviewchris wrote: »

I suspect I now know why so many ATMs can afford to allow free withdrawals.

This made me laugh, it's clearly absolute rubbish.

The banks/ATM operators are not out to get you, they obviously have to check these things out, as otherwise you'd have people taking advantage of the system all the time. Lloyds will have to check with RBS, who will be able to back up your story.

dacouch

I agree the banks would not be trying to scam you on the ATM, they have no need to as if they make a mistake or want more money they can just ponce it off the tax payer

Inactive

dacouch wrote: »

I agree the banks would not be trying to scam you on the ATM, they have no need to as if they make a mistake or want more money they can just ponce it off the tax payer

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl: Very true.. :T

noelphobic

rochfordpeople wrote: »

Thank you for your response!

Why would they say that there wasn't a problem though, when I know 100% that there was? If they are only checked once a month, would they know when a problem occured?

The machine should be emptied of cash on a regular basis and new cash put in. Then the cash that has been taken out should be balanced against what the records say has been withdrawn. If there is a misbalance and they have more money than they think they should have then they should be able to pay you back.

I used to have a job trying to balance the accounts for ATMs (but not for any of the banks mentioned here!) and it could be a nightmare at times.