Money credited to someone else's account!

trenale

Hi

My wife attempted to transfer £3,000 to her online ISA account. She used her ISA account number and Current account sorting code. Unfortunately the sort code for the ISA is different to her Current account and the money has now been credited to someone else's account. The bank say they are not responsible as my wife made the mistake. However they have attempted to reclaim the money. The person who has received the money is not paying it back. The bank cannot give us any details of who received the money due to confidentiality.

Any ideas anyone?
Thanks

barginbin

thats terrible all i can say is i hope you get all the money back.

AndyR_3

You should write a letter, to the person who recieved the money, and ask your bank to pass it on. Advise in the letter that the payment was made due to a mistake of fact and you are legally entitled to recover the money. Ask them to return it within 14 days. After 14 days if it's not been recieved back, write again saying if it's not been recieved the matter will be passed to your solicitor.

That's how we (at a bank) do it, and the first letter usually gets ignored but the second one is usually swiftly followed by a refund!

MarkyMarkD

How is that going to work when the bank is never going to give you the details of the third party to make the legal claim against?

I think you need to rely on the bank recalling the money.

LittleVoice

And the OP reminds me of all those other messages saying "I've got £XXXX deposited in my account and the bank now says it's an error and want it back. Why should I give it back, it's not my fault - and can I also have compensation for the stress caused to me by the error?"

Good luck to trenale on this one, though.

chica_fi

The bank will be your best hope as a letter from them to the unintended recipient will sound more official than one from yourself. They will have a procedure they follow and you need to let it take its course. Unfortunately

trenale

Thank you all for your advice. AndyR - thanks for your input. I will use this as a last resort. Will keep the thread up to date with progress.

Compound_2

Are your current account and ISA at the same bank? If so, it means your bank is using duplicate account numbers which isn't that common. I remember phoning a call centre which managed to get my account from just the number, no sort code.

If you want to get the money ASAP, you could try an offer allowing the other party to keep say £25 in return for promptly returning your money.

trenale

Hi Compound
I was also most surprised that this could happen. When I worked for a bank all account numbers were unique. Now it seems that account numbers are only unique in combination with sort code. Also account numbers were based on some algorithm, making it difficult to transpose numbers and have a valid account number. Presumably wrong postings may become more common(?)

Compound_2

trenale, my understanding was that things were moving in the opposite direction. New bank accounts are sometimes opened at a centralized sort code, regardless of where you hand your application in. Many are now applying by internet/phone/post. Local branches have less of a role in servicing accounts, replaced by centralized fulfilment units. You'd be lucky to get a direct branch phone no!

I suppose duplicate numbers could arise as a result of a merger, eg Lloyds TSB. NatWest has sort codes beginning 56 and 60, I believe originating from when National and Westminster were separate. It would be surprising to have this problem if your sort codes share the same first two digits.

chica_fi

Compound wrote: »

trenale, my understanding was that things were moving in the opposite direction. New bank accounts are sometimes opened at a centralized sort code, regardless of where you hand your application in. Many are now applying by internet/phone/post. Local branches have less of a role in servicing accounts, replaced by centralized fulfilment units. You'd be lucky to get a direct branch phone no!

I suppose duplicate numbers could arise as a result of a merger, eg Lloyds TSB. NatWest has sort codes beginning 56 and 60, I believe originating from when National and Westminster were separate. It would be surprising to have this problem if your sort codes share the same first two digits.

The banks that offer a direct number to your branch will more often than not be too busy to answer the phone to you!!! The bank i work for has a contact centre which can deal with 80% of the queries people phone with (ordering new cheque book, cancel standing orders etc) and the rest will be put through to the branch for us to deal with directly. If we had to answer the phone to every customer who wanted to know their balance or transfer some money or just fancied a chat (believe me, it happens) then we would be doing nothing but answering phones. Then there would be big queues at the counter and people would moan about that!!! We can't always win...