Lost £200! :'(

Morty_007

I really feel for you Ryan, its a carpy thing to have happen. I'm a little confused about the timings though. You say that you returned to the machine within 5 seconds yet you then say that by the time you confronted the man the machine was telling him he had taken too long with his transaction...I don't understand how he could pocket your money then get his card in the machine then spend too long over his transaction in the space of 15 seconds max??

What did the police say?

Good luck

RyanArena

chuckley wrote: »

how is it you left the man to 'scuttle off'?!

I had no proof and he was much bigger than I am!

RyanArena

Morty_007 wrote: »

You say that you returned to the machine within 5 seconds yet you then say that by the time you confronted the man the machine was telling him he had taken too long with his transaction...I don't understand how he could pocket your money then get his card in the machine then spend too long over his transaction in the space of 15 seconds max??

I was stood speaking to him for a while asking him whether anyone else had been there and whether the money had even come out in the first place, then the machine told him he had taken too long, and he used that as an excuse to say the machine was broken and ran off.

I've spoken to the police and they said they would look into it but it's not easy to get permission to look into who has been using cash machines, and that the whole process of it would take up a lot of valuable police time when (not in as many words) it was my own fault for being a wally!

I understand where they're coming from & the thought did occur to me that finding out who had used the cash machine, checking bus station CCTV, tracking the guy down, trying to get the money back and all the permissions and stonewalls in the way would take up quite a lot of time away from investigating crimes where the victim had done nothing wrong.

If nothing else I'll learn from this (just applied for a debit card & online banking so I don't have to use ATMs as much) and I'll never make that mistake again. And I also stumbled across a neat new website where 90% of people are polite and helpful.

ALSO! My mum has offered to help me out with the deposit for the holiday and my boss bought me a KFC dinner to cheer me up!

Thanks to you all for support, tips and advice and I hope you don't think I've thrown it away by conceding.

Kind (and no longer angry) regards,
Ryan

balmk

You must log this with the police - if you are in an area which offers the non-emergencies crime reporting service (dial 101 from your landline) you can register it over the phone and someone from your local constabulary will be in touch with you. Alternatively contact your local station and get them to send your local officer around to take a statement.

If the chap put his card in the machine, he is trackable as the machine will have recorded his details. This information can be obtained by the police from cashpoint operator.

If he is shown on CCTV he can still be identifed.

Don't let him get away with it - theft is theft is theft.

meer53

You should call your bank and ask them to dispute this as non dispense of cash. You can't be 100% certain that this man did take your money so your bank should dispute it for you. As another poster has said, it can sometimes be taken back into the machine and the owner of the ATM can't identify whose account it belongs in until your bank claims from them.

Incyder

meer53 wrote: »

You should call your bank and ask them to dispute this as non dispense of cash. You can't be 100% certain that this man did take your money so your bank should dispute it for you. As another poster has said, it can sometimes be taken back into the machine and the owner of the ATM can't identify whose account it belongs in until your bank claims from them.

I agree, get down there in person or ring them and find out for sure.

jambosans

As others have suggested, contact Halifax and raise an "ATM Dispute". It is not the advisors job to second guess what happened at the machine, they simply complete a form which is then escalated to a department (within the Halifax) who pass it over to the ATM operator to investigate. If the money was pulled back into the machine but not re-acredited to your account, then you should get the money back.

Also, forget about dealing with the bus station or ATM owner directly. They will not allow you to view their CCTV, and the matter should be dealt with by the police. Regardless of how trivial they (the police) or you may think the matter is, a crime may have been committed, and it's the duty of the police to investigate.

chambta

On the off-chance it was retracted this would only be reconciled with your account after the machine had been balanced or refilled. In 'remote' locations this may only be once a week. The posters stating it would 'not be debited' or it would be 'back in your account tomorrow' are talking nonsense.

Fingers crossed for you. As someone said the reaction of most people would be to instinctively call back the previous user. The man could either have been on drugs, hungry or plainly dishonest - sometimes lessons in life are expensive though.