Santander trying to steal £14,200 from me

matttye

Azelphur wrote: »

Had some fun this morning since again I was lied to about the situation being resolved again, called up and apparently they've lost the proof yet again. One of my friends recommended I call the police and report them for theft. I was dubious about it so called the police actionfraud department. They said I should go into my local police station and file a report for theft. I called the bank one last time to give them one last opportunity to resolve it and they refused, so off I went to the police station. On the way to the police station in the car I got a somewhat frantic call from a manager at Santander telling me that it wasn't nescesary, and that I just needed to wait...yea, not happening, so I went into the police station. Talked to a detective about it and explained what actionfraud had told me, and explained what had happened so far. She agree'd with me and I ended up with quite a few people all gathered in the reception of the police station as she called the bank to listen in on what was happening, she called them and they agree'd to release my uncontested funds rather quickly, which is a good start, and I went in branch to withdraw that and it all went smoothly.

The interesting part however, is that Santander lied to a police detective, they said to the police detective that RBS had already had the money returned to them, then when I went in branch to collect they told me that the disputed funds were still being investigated as to whether I could keep them or not, and they are going to put that in writing! so I will soon in theory have written proof that Santander lied to a police detective. Crazy!

As for the reason I reported some of the posts -
Not helpful at all
Off topic for the thread / thread hijacking
Lots of posts by those users are 100% in violation of the rule I quoted
IMO it's trolling and attempting to turn the thread into a flame war because they have a personal vendetta against bitcoin.

I don't make the rules, I just mentioned that I reported it to a moderator as it seems to be in clear violation of the forum rules, it's up to the moderators to decide not me. I will continue to ignore all the troll/stupid posts and keep updating anyway.

No offence but I find that a bit hard to believe. The police would not usually waste their time talking to someone about civil matters. The bank can't be guilty of theft as they have no intention of permanently depriving you of what is yours.

Azelphur

Some people seem intent on calling me a liar, at the end of the day it almost seems akin to the people who go around chanting "FAKE" on youtube videos. If you don't believe me and just want to continually chant I'm a liar, then perhaps you should find something better to do with your time. None the less I'll post this here and see if it alleviates any doubt. https://www.dropbox.com/s/haxh5j30fa49dla/2013-05-14%2020.56.16.jpg?m

I admit the whole story is getting a bit hard to believe with the police involvement, but that's what happened, as for police gathering around in the reception...I live in Margate, not a lot goes on around here, the police did say that it was unlikely that an arrest would be made, but there's nothing stopping a police officer from phoning up the bank and having a discussion with them about it, which they did, and it worked very well, as it ended up at least getting me some of my money back! The bank did speak to me on the phone and run me through security checks, at which point I gave them permission to speak to the police officer about my account, which they did.

tonycottee wrote: »

Mind you, only 8 months back the OP stated that he was on benefits and had just been refused a credit card. Seems his fortunes have changed a fair bit since then.

I've been saying from the start it's pretty crazy. I do remember those days. Gone from a grubby old flat on one of the worst streets in town to a really nice place overlooking the sea. The funny part is, that even now with the money that I have, I would still get refused for that credit card most likely as I am self employed without tax history, haha!

innovate wrote: »

This episode doesn't now reflect too well on the bitcoiners, either.

Why not? I am trying as hard as I can to be reasonable and handle the situation in a sensible manner as advised by large pools of people. At the end of the day that's about all one can do in a situation like this.

I think it's time that I waded in on the bitcoin misconceptions, so many people in here seem to be making statements and judgements based on such incorrect information, and I know it's offtopic for the thread and will probably open a whole new can of worms, but so many people seem to want to talk about it, so lets talk about it.

First off I'll explain what I do, I'm a bitcoin trader. That means I buy bitcoins at a low price (usually below the market price) and sell them on for a higher price. This is not "playing the market" as some people have said, market fluctuations do affect me obviously, but generally speaking, unless the value of a bitcoin goes down after every time I buy, I stand to make a profit, as there is always a wall between what I buy at and what I sell at. I am pretty much like your local high street currency exchange shop, just with bitcoins.

Some people are mentioning bitcoin and backing, so I'll touch on that too. Most currencies in the world are fiat, which is money that derives its value from government regulation or law. If that government fails, or makes bad decisions, your currency can devalue, or even become totally worthless. Non-fiat currency is a currency that is backed by something (gold, for example). Bitcoin is sort of a non-fiat currency. The way the network works it that in order to create the bitcoins in the first place, you need computer hardware, and lots of it. This hardware indisputably has value (even if you have to melt it down to it's base components such as gold, copper, etc) as such, Bitcoin is actually backed by the hardware required to create it, If everything goes sideways, you can still sell that big computer and get some of your money back. This of course doesn't help people who arn't mining, and are instead just using it as a currency, hence why I say "sort of a non-fiat currency"

People are mentioning things you can buy with Bitcoin, the common argument about how you can't pay for day to day life with it has sprung up. This is debatable, There are actually people out there right now, who live 100% off bitcoins, so it CAN be done, it's just difficult. There's a trading market called bitcoin-otc which allows you to connect with people who will purchase things for you in exchange for bitcoins, so while you may not be able to go down to your local Tesco with your smartphone and pay them in Bitcoins, you can get someone on bitcoin-otc to sell you a tesco voucher for bitcoins, which you could then spend at Tesco. Besides that, a growing number of large businesses are starting to pay bitcoin note, businesses like mega and reddit are now accepting Bitcoins, and there is a huge list of retailers at https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Trade which all accept bitcoins. On top of that people like me are working to get the tax/legal situation sorted so that we can start enabling local shops. So maybe in the future you will be able to go to your local Tesco and pay with bitcoins, that'd be cool. Or it's all just a passing fad and will be gone next week, but that's the game we play.

Next up, bitcoin and dodgy/illegal stuff. Yes, we know it's there, Drugs and other such things are commonly traded for Bitcoin. I don't condone the illegal activity and do my best to stay clear of it. Unfortunately the same can be said about any currency and this is not a situation that is limited to, or caused by, bitcoin. Did you know that 80% of all British banknotes contain traces of drugs?. Bitcoin as a technology is neutral, and has the potential to change the way the finances of the entire world happen, lets not allow it to be ruined by a few bad eggs.

Hoping this wall of text will help to calm people down instead of inflame the situation further, we shall see!

grumbler

JuicyJesus wrote: »

There is no such presumption with fraud cases in banks, especially ones as clear cut as "customer in receipt of stolen funds".

It's a pity that banks are allowed to ignore routinely such general principle.
"Stolen funds" should be blocked of course, but not all funds. And some clear timescale has to be set up for the investigation, that clearly is not the case when banks are allowed to relax and drag their feet for as long as they want.

Why on earth "stolen funds" are different from stolen goods?

JuicyJesus

Azelphur wrote: »

First off I'll explain what I do, I'm a bitcoin trader. That means I buy bitcoins at a low price (usually below the market price) and sell them on for a higher price. This is not "playing the market" as some people have said, market fluctuations do affect me obviously, but generally speaking, unless the value of a bitcoin goes down after every time I buy, I stand to make a profit, as there is always a wall between what I buy at and what I sell at. I am pretty much like your local high street currency exchange shop, just with bitcoins.

How is that NOT playing the market? Your entire business model is predicated on the value of Bitcoin never falling significantly. As soon as it does, you and your business are f*cked.

Some people are mentioning bitcoin and backing, so I'll touch on that too. Most currencies in the world are fiat, which is money that derives its value from government regulation or law. If that government fails, or makes bad decisions, your currency can devalue, or even become totally worthless. Non-fiat currency is a currency that is backed by something (gold, for example). Bitcoin is sort of a non-fiat currency. The way the network works it that in order to create the bitcoins in the first place, you need computer hardware, and lots of it. This hardware indisputably has value (even if you have to melt it down to it's base components such as gold, copper, etc) as such, Bitcoin is actually backed by the hardware required to create it

That is utter horsesh*t. That's like saying tenners are backed by the printing presses used to make them. It makes no sense.

People are mentioning things you can buy with Bitcoin, the common argument about how you can't pay for day to day life with it has sprung up. This is debatable, There are actually people out there right now, who live 100% off bitcoins, so it CAN be done, it's just difficult. There's a trading market called bitcoin-otc which allows you to connect with people who will purchase things for you in exchange for bitcoins, so while you may not be able to go down to your local Tesco with your smartphone and pay them in Bitcoins, you can get someone on bitcoin-otc to sell you a tesco voucher for bitcoins, which you could then spend at Tesco.

So it's money that works less well than actual money.

Issue: I could probably find people who'd swap Tesco vouchers for printed pictures of bunny rabbits. That does not mean they are a viable currency.

Hell, why not just use Tesco vouchers rather than Bitcoin? Where exactly is the difference? At least Tesco vouchers have their value somewhat guaranteed by Tesco.

Besides that, a growing number of large businesses are starting to pay bitcoin note, businesses like mega and reddit are now accepting Bitcoins

Mega, the business based around the sharing of other peoples' copyrighted material? Reddit, the social news site which is free for everyone to use and has a less than savoury element to its user base? Yes, there's a pair of ringing endorsements.

On top of that people like me are working to get the tax/legal situation sorted so that we can start enabling local shops.

Which will not work since you would have to persuade people to exchange pounds for money that does the same thing only less well, or conversely persuade local businesses to accept the same in exchange for goods that cost actual money.

So maybe in the future you will be able to go to your local Tesco and pay with bitcoins, that'd be cool. Or it's all just a passing fad and will be gone next week, but that's the game we play.

At least you recognise to some extent that it's a pipe dream. And it is a pipe dream.

Next up, bitcoin and dodgy/illegal stuff. Yes, we know it's there, Drugs and other such things are commonly traded for Bitcoin. I don't condone the illegal activity and do my best to stay clear of it. Unfortunately the same can be said about any currency and this is not a situation that is limited to, or caused by, bitcoin. Did you know that 80% of all British banknotes contain traces of drugs?. Bitcoin as a technology is neutral, and has the potential to change the way the finances of the entire world happen, lets not allow it to be ruined by a few bad eggs.

But the vast majority of transactions in sterling are perfectly legitimate. Can you say the same for Bitcoin? An entire cottage industry has sprung up around it because it offers instant anonymous distance value transfer, which inevitably attracts drug dealers, arms dealers and other criminals because it's so damn perfect for the purpose of crime.

nelly12

unfortunately all of this is becoming unbelievable. I would presume that most of the posters on here do not work for a bank nor have any understanding of Anti Money Laundering Policies that banks must adhere to. From the very first post the evidence has pointed towards this triggering something internally with the bank. It sounds to me like the branch has fobbed the OP off with promises of resolution when I would be sure that they are as much in the dark as the OP. There would be no line drawn between disputed and undisputed funds? I may be wrong? The introduction of the Police again sparks doubts on the credibility because let me assure you the bank has very strict guidelines to work to here and some local detective would have NO influence on this. As someone has again posted this guy has gone from unemployed to having big chunks of cash in his account, and very quickly. This story may have some elements of truth (and if so then good luck to the OP whatever he trades in it's risky), but I personally doubt most of this story!

Azelphur

JuicyJesus wrote: »

How is that NOT playing the market? Your entire business model is predicated on the value of Bitcoin never falling significantly. As soon as it does, you and your business are f*cked.

Playing the market entails buying when the market price is low, and selling it back when the market price is high, trying to speculate on the value in order to make a profit, which is not what I am doing.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

That is utter horsesh*t. That's like saying tenners are backed by the printing presses used to make them. It makes no sense.

The difference is that the computers are owned by the users of the currency, and thus the value is returned to the user, also the value of the currency is tied to the bitcoin network difficulty, meaning that your computer hardware value is proportionate to the value of a bitcoin.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

So it's money that works less well than actual money.

Issue: I could probably find people who'd swap Tesco vouchers for printed pictures of bunny rabbits. That does not mean they are a viable currency.

Hell, why not just use Tesco vouchers rather than Bitcoin? Where exactly is the difference? At least Tesco vouchers have their value somewhat guaranteed by Tesco.

In my opinion it works better than actual money. It solves a lot of the inherent problems that exist with currency today. I have a small shop who is very interested in being my first test shop when I get to the point of enabling local shops. The problem is with the credit card companies (Visa, MasterCard). They take quite a large percentage on the transactions (Which the shop has to account for in its pricing!). There's also allegations of price fixing and other such badness. Bitcoin solves these issues by making payment processing a competitive market again, rather than the current "Our way or the highway" system. Bitcoin has the potential to make everything you buy cheaper, if widely adopted.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Mega, the business based around the sharing of other peoples' copyrighted material? Reddit, the social news site which is free for everyone to use and has a less than savoury element to its user base? Yes, there's a pair of ringing endorsements.

If you don't like those, how about [PayPal?

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Which will not work since you would have to persuade people to exchange pounds for money that does the same thing only less well, or conversely persuade local businesses to accept the same in exchange for goods that cost actual money.

My initial plan was to automatically convert all Bitcoins into GBP for the merchant, essentially giving them a feeless payment method.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

But the vast majority of transactions in sterling are perfectly legitimate. Can you say the same for Bitcoin? An entire cottage industry has sprung up around it because it offers instant anonymous distance value transfer, which inevitably attracts drug dealers, arms dealers and other criminals because it's so damn perfect for the purpose of crime.

Maybe you missed me when I pointed out 80% of GBP is covered in drugs. 80% of the currency being covered in drugs kind of rules out the majority of the currency being used for legitimate transactions xD

Azelphur

nelly12 wrote: »

As someone has again posted this guy has gone from unemployed to having big chunks of cash in his account, and very quickly.

I did quite well because of the recent spike and managed to quite effectively dodge the massive drop afterwards, I've become quite good at predicting where the market will go. I found something I enjoy, am capable of doing, and makes me money. Who in their right mind would turn down such an opportunity?

matttye

Azelphur wrote: »

Playing the market entails buying when the market price is low, and selling it back when the market price is high, trying to speculate on the value in order to make a profit, which is not what I am doing.



The difference is that the computers are owned by the users of the currency, and thus the value is returned to the user, also the value of the currency is tied to the bitcoin network difficulty, meaning that your computer hardware value is proportionate to the value of a bitcoin.



In my opinion it works better than actual money. It solves a lot of the inherent problems that exist with currency today. I have a small shop who is very interested in being my first test shop when I get to the point of enabling local shops. The problem is with the credit card companies (Visa, MasterCard). They take quite a large percentage on the transactions (Which the shop has to account for in its pricing!). There's also allegations of price fixing and other such badness. Bitcoin solves these issues by making payment processing a competitive market again, rather than the current "Our way or the highway" system. Bitcoin has the potential to make everything you buy cheaper, if widely adopted.



If you don't like those, how about [PayPal?


My initial plan was to automatically convert all Bitcoins into GBP for the merchant, essentially giving them a feeless payment method.



Maybe you missed me when I pointed out 80% of GBP is covered in drugs. 80% of the currency being covered in drugs kind of rules out the majority of the currency being used for legitimate transactions xD

Bitcoins won't be covered in drugs but bitnotes might be. :rotfl:

JuicyJesus

Azelphur wrote: »

Playing the market entails buying when the market price is low, and selling it back when the market price is high, trying to speculate on the value in order to make a profit, which is not what I am doing.

So what ARE you doing? Your description of it is exactly that. Unless your assumption is that Bitcoin will never ever fall in value and therefore you're not speculating, which would be not only moronic but also the most stunning example of wishful thinking I've ever heard.

So you buy the Bitcoins low... you sell them high... how is that not speculation?

The difference is that the computers are owned by the users of the currency, and thus the value is returned to the user, also the value of the currency is tied to the bitcoin network difficulty, meaning that your computer hardware value is proportionate to the value of a bitcoin.

So if I receive Bitcoins as payment for something and then the value crashes, I get a share of their computer? Or do I just sell mine to make up the loss?

Sorry, your explanation is idiotic. Kindly, actually think through what you are saying rather than parroting whatever b*llocks people on Bitcoin-related IRC channels have come up with.

In my opinion it works better than actual money. It solves a lot of the inherent problems that exist with currency today. I have a small shop who is very interested in being my first test shop when I get to the point of enabling local shops. The problem is with the credit card companies (Visa, MasterCard). They take quite a large percentage on the transactions (Which the shop has to account for in its pricing!). There's also allegations of price fixing and other such badness. Bitcoin solves these issues by making payment processing a competitive market again, rather than the current "Our way or the highway" system. Bitcoin has the potential to make everything you buy cheaper, if widely adopted.

Yes, it just involves switching my money to an entirely new currency which is currently subject to a bubble.

Why not just use sterling cash? No credit card fees. No nothing. Prices won't fall unless literally nobody uses credit or debit cards to buy any more - which is astonishingly unlikely to happen since most people simply do not care about Bitcoin.

My initial plan was to automatically convert all Bitcoins into GBP for the merchant, essentially giving them a feeless payment method.

Gee, what an amazing idea. Even better, why not simply just use GBP? All your ideas are based around the idea that people will use Bitcoin because they want to use Bitcoin so much that they will go to extra lengths to use it, when very few people will because it makes no goddamn sense.

Maybe you missed me when I pointed out 80% of GBP is covered in drugs. 80% of the currency being covered in drugs kind of rules out the majority of the currency being used for legitimate transactions xD

Yes, because banknotes don't rub up against each other or anything which might transfer substances, and banknotes aren't just used to snort cocaine because they're conveniently shaped, conveniently sized and overall convenient for that purpose.

Anyway, we are not talking about the physical notes, we are talking about TRANSACTIONAL. And transactional use of sterling for legal, legitimate reasons forms most of the use of sterling, whereas Bitcoin is largely used for ILlegal, non-legitimate transactions because of innate characteristics of it making it quite suited for them.

This argument is, in any event, fruitless; you have decided where you stand, and Bitcoin fans do have a habit of having extremely rose-tinted spectacles, streaks of wishful thinking and cherrypicking evidence when it comes to their beloved "currency" which I'm nowhere near arrogant enough to assume I could possibly overcome. And if you want to chuck your money into what is quite transparently a Ponzi scheme, who am I to stop you? Just kindly reflect on the fact that banks, who surely would be all over Bitcoin if it was even remotely a viable proposition or wise business area to be in, will not touch it or businesses who deal in it with a bloody bargepole.

Azelphur

JuicyJesus wrote: »

So what ARE you doing? Your description of it is exactly that.

It's the difference between a currency exchange and a forex trader, I am a currency exchange, I don't play the exchange rate like a forex trader would.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

So if I receive Bitcoins as payment for something and then the value crashes, I get a share of their computer? Or do I just sell mine to make up the loss?

Sorry, your explanation is idiotic.

I already mentioned this before, please read my threads before replying to them. To quote myself:

This of course doesn't help people who arn't mining, and are instead just using it as a currency, hence why I say "sort of a non-fiat currency"

also please try to refrain from throwing insults, it's not a good look.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Yes, it just involves switching my money to an entirely new currency which is currently subject to a bubble.

That's your opinion and your entitled to it, I am personally unsure myself, but only time will tell.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Why not just use sterling cash? No credit card fees. No nothing. Prices won't fall unless literally nobody uses credit or debit cards to buy any more - which is astonishingly unlikely to happen since most people simply do not care about Bitcoin.

Because sterling cash can't teleport to the other side of the world, it's also generally inconvenient in the day and age of credit cards, NFC payments, etc.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Gee, what an amazing idea. Even better, why not simply just use GBP? All your ideas are based around the idea that people will use Bitcoin because they want to use Bitcoin so much that they will go to extra lengths to use it, when very few people will because it makes no goddamn sense.

It makes plenty of sense, it solves a lot of the problems with the current financial system, inflation, price fixing, anti-competitiveness, and funny enough chargeback fraud (oh the irony), bitcoin has the potential to solve a lot of these things.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Yes, because banknotes don't rub up against each other or anything which might transfer substances, and banknotes aren't just used to snort cocaine because they're conveniently shaped, conveniently sized and overall convenient for that purpose.

That much is obvious.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Anyway, we are not talking about the physical notes, we are talking about TRANSACTIONAL. And transactional use of sterling for legal, legitimate reasons forms most of the use of sterling, whereas Bitcoin is largely used for ILlegal, non-legitimate transactions because of innate characteristics of it making it quite suited for them.

Do you have any statistics for the amount of bitcoins and GBP that are used in drug trading? Because things like this are fairly impossible to make judgements on. But for the sake of argument lets say that your assumption is correct and that the majority of bitcoin is used for drug trading, that still doesn't make bitcoin itself bad, merely the people who are using it illegally. Bitcoin has many perfectly legitimate uses, and is regularly used in legitimate scenarios.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

This argument is, in any event, fruitless; you have decided where you stand, and Bitcoin fans do have a habit of having extremely rose-tinted spectacles, streaks of wishful thinking and cherrypicking evidence when it comes to their beloved "currency" which I'm nowhere near arrogant enough to assume I could possibly overcome.

I believe they are called opinions, perhaps mine are different to yours and you should learn to deal with that rather than throwing insults all over the place

JuicyJesus wrote: »

And if you want to chuck your money into what is quite transparently a Ponzi scheme

I suggest you go read up on the definition of a ponzi scheme. Bitcoin bares absolutely no similarities to a ponzi scheme whatsoever. However it is indeed up to me where I put my money, I have indeed made my decision regarding bitcoin, if it doesn't pan out, perhaps I will learn an important life lesson. But personally I prefer to have a little optimism and not think that things are doom to fail before they've had a chance to even start. Also considering I came from a position of having little to no money, and now have plenty, I'd hardly call this venture a failure so far.

JuicyJesus wrote: »

who am I to stop you? Just kindly reflect on the fact that banks, who surely would be all over Bitcoin if it was even remotely a viable proposition or wise business area to be in, will not touch it or businesses who deal in it with a bloody bargepole.

I would say quite the opposite, Bitcoin is a threat to their entire business model, thus banks are anti bitcoin because it is a threat to them.