Building society used wrong sort code for payment

bizziebod

I paid my energy bill at the building society branch by direct payment as it was over £800 and the cashier mis-typed the sortcode so the money went into another account at Nat West and not into nPower's. I found this out when I got further demands from nPower and eventually managed to scrape together enough to pay the bill.

My building society call center tried to trace the money but had no luck and failed to tell me. Now the branch are trying to trace the payment with Nat West as it went in to another collection account for 62-30-06. However the Nat West staff just tell the building society staff that data protection applies and they can't tell us where the money has gone and they need to contact the account holder. Nat West have said this for 2 weeks but don't appear to be contacting anyone.

I've found the address of the branch with that sort code and tried to phone them to find how to proceed - but the number is not connected.

How can I get my money back?

xylophone

the cashier mis-typed the sortcode

It is up to the building society to reimburse you and chase Natwest for the money? Have you raised an official complaint?

coldhandoff

Make a complaint, it's not your responsibility to chase people to get the money back.

Rafter

Building societies error - they should refund you immediately and be responsible for recovering the money.

If they don't then complain. In any case they should pay you compensation and interest for the fact you have had to pay the bill twice.

R.

pmduk

As coolhandoff says make a formal complaint, the society should make good the money and then try to reclaim it.

bizziebod

Thanks for your advice. I went back to the building society and got the manager to speak to their head office. As a result they have credited me money and will pursue NatWest separately. I'm going to be a lot more cautious with direct bank transfer payments in future!