Sent Full Bank Details for someone thats not me!

Laneyboo

Hi everyone,

I thought i would ask your advice on something.. This morning i recieved a letter from my bank (HBOS) and opened it without even thinking to find a statement for an account that has gone £400 beyond their overdraft limit with full account details including roll no, sort code, account number and iban number. This person is NOT me yet it has my full address and correct postcode (which not many people know or get correct).. ive double checked via online banking and this is not a statement for one of my accounts. The name is different but i have no clue who it is. Completely panicked and beginning to think my address has been used for some sort of identity fraud, although its not using my name - what would you say to the bank? do you think they can give me compensation for such a gross mistake and how do i know the other person hasn't been given all of MY details?!!!

HELP!

stugib

Laneyboo wrote: »

Hi everyone,

I thought i would ask your advice on something.. This morning i recieved a letter from my bank (HBOS) and opened it without even thinking to find a statement for an account that has gone £400 beyond their overdraft limit with full account details including roll no, sort code, account number and iban number. This person is NOT me yet it has my full address and correct postcode (which not many people know or get correct).. ive double checked via online banking and this is not a statement for one of my accounts. The name is different but i have no clue who it is. Completely panicked and beginning to think my address has been used for some sort of identity fraud, although its not using my name - what would you say to the bank? do you think they can give me compensation for such a gross mistake and how do i know the other person hasn't been given all of MY details?!!!

HELP!

What exactly are they to compensate you for? What losses have you suffered?

Maybe someone has opened an account for your address, maybe it's a computer glitch, who knows - ring them and find out and they can investigate for you.

Last month I got our mortgage offer through with a covering letter attached to the back for a different customer with all their address and bank details on it. I could've reported them to the Information Commissioner, approached a newspaper, demanded compensation etc etc, but mistakes happen and as long as I or the other person hasn't suffered why make a big deal out of it? When I told them they did take it very seriously and were very grateful - that was enough for me.

Nicki

This has happened before and usually it is because either the customer has accidentally given an incorrect postcode or the bank has keyed in the wrong postcode.

You have suffered no loss and are entitled to no compensation. Strictly speaking you should not have opened mail bearing someone else's name, even if sent to your address, so even though you did so by accident, I would be very leery of going in all guns blazing demanding compo, as you may find yourself the subject of a mail tampering investigation.

Just return the statement to the bank with a note saying the letter was opened in error, and that there is no one by that name living at your address

Altarf

Nicki wrote: »

Strictly speaking you should not have opened mail bearing someone else's name, even if sent to your address, so even though you did so by accident, I would be very leery of going in all guns blazing demanding compo, as you may find yourself the subject of a mail tampering investigation.

Incorrect. You are perfectly entitled to open any mail that is delivered to your house, as it has finished being 'transmitted' by the Royal Mail as they only deliver to an address not an individual. You are only committing an offence if you intend doing something dishonest with the contents.

Postal Services Act 2000, section 84 -

http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00026--f.htm#84

grannybroon

We once had a lawyer's letter for a neighbour who had just moved in (addressed to our house). We felt we should open it to try and ascertain where it should have gone. It was the neighbour's Dad's final estate letter but never really read it, realising it wasn't for us. We asked around, ascertained who it should have gone to, delivered by hand (and welcomed to the neighbourhood) with an apology. No problem. However, I would say you send statement back to bank immediately pointing out that definitely not you and please check your records.

GB

dianediana

Hi Laneyboo
Hang on a min, your post sent me into a panic.
Approximately 3 weeks ago "Watchdog" on BBC1 were reporting the same storys of it happening to a few people.
The scarey part is, as you are no doubt aware, you have somones private details I.E Account/Sort Code numbers which suggests that HBOS are extremely lax in their data protection.
Halifax were mentioned on "Watchdog" as were HSBC
The advice they gave a customer was to contact the branch the letter came from, i know i would not like someone recieveing my details in their mail.
It guess it would'nt take too long, for some unscruplicous person to come along and create havoc with a letter containing the dynamite you have written there.
If it's happening enough to be broadcast to the nation via TV, then we are all potential victims.
Put it this way Laneyboo?
Who has YOUR DETAILS?

Take care!

advent1122

Laneyboo wrote: »

do you think they can give me compensation for such a gross mistake

Totally absurd.

vetfred

I think I would be calling the fraud department of my bank to get advice on what's going on and why "you" received the letter although it was your address that received the eltter so to speak. Without knowing why this has happened I wouldn't assume anyone is liable for anything or that I'm somehow owed money when I may not have suffered any financial loss or suffered in any other way other than to have opened a letter which caused concern and could be easily explained and sorted out.

It could be argued that deliberately opening mail addressed to someone else is an offence since it is intentionally detrimental to them - they get their private information seen by people who shouldn't be privy to it. In fact, deliberately opening mail addressed to someone else goes against 84 1a and 3. The delivery to an address does not constitute the delivery to the individual it is addressed to and that's why all UK undeliberable mail gets sent to Belfast's Royal Mail people who are the only RM workers with the right to open undeliverable mail (as do the police if granted permission as part of an investigation).

Altarf

vetfred wrote: »

It could be argued that deliberately opening mail addressed to someone else is an offence since it is intentionally detrimental to them - they get their private information seen by people who shouldn't be privy to it. In fact, deliberately opening mail addressed to someone else goes against 84 1a and 3. The delivery to an address does not constitute the delivery to the individual it is addressed to and that's why all UK undeliberable mail gets sent to Belfast's Royal Mail people who are the only RM workers with the right to open undeliverable mail (as do the police if granted permission as part of an investigation).

You may argue that but you would be wrong. Section 84(1) only applies whilst the letter is being 'transmitted'. Once it is through the letter box of the house it is addressed to it is delivered, so only section 84(3) can apply.

Undeliverable mail is mail that cannot be delivered to an address. Once it has been delivered it is well, delivered. As I said before, Royal Mail does not offer a delivery service to a person, only to an address. Once it is at that address it is delivered and its 'transmission' has ended.

Section 84(3) creates an offence when a person intending to act to a person's detriment and without reasonable excuse, he opens a postal packet which he knows or reasonably suspects has been incorrectly delivered to him.

So you need to have inteded to act to their detriment before you opened the letter, not after you opened the letter (you may commit other offences if you did something naughty then). So even if you accept the somewhat tenuous argument that knowing the contents of the letter would act to their detriment, you would have to prove that they knew what was in the letter before they opened it, and that they knew it had been incorrectly delivered to them.

vetfred

In answering the question about opening letters addressed to a previous occupant, the Postal Services Watchdog says: "Under the Postal Services Act 2000, a person commits an offence if they open an item of post which they know or reasonably suspect has been correctly delivered to the address - but addressed to a previous occupant."

Prior Acts such as one from 1953 (along with later ones) stated it was an offence to open mail addressed to someone else or to impede or prevent its delivery to the correct person. In the 2000 Act's explanatory notes in relation to 84 (1), it says this newest Act: "amalgamates the content of offences previously included in the Post Office Act 1953." It also, just as before, has provisions for the people who can be deliberately opening mail not addressed to them.

Taking the Regulation of Investigory Powers Act 2000, it states "It shall be an offence for a person intentionally and without lawful authority to intercept, at any place in the United Kingdom, any communication in the course of its transmission by means of a public postal service." That Act describes postal items as something in writing "used by the sender for imparting information to the recipient" and not information just sent to an address.

Although many things in whatever Act will be open to interpretation into whatever we want them to be, to me the intentions of the Act you linked to are quite clear. Along with the information Royal Mail gives out on this to customers or employees (of which I have been one and perhaps you or others here have too) and the Watchdog, I'm more than happy to be thinking it is wrong to be opening other people's mail deliberately - whether any prosecution would come of it is probably incredibly unlikely anyway since one can always say they did not reasonably suspect it wasn't for them or whatever.

One could deem delivery to an address as the end of the postal item's transmission in the postal service, whereas the post also includes the redirecting facility to actually get the letter to the intended recipient. After all, people use the postal system in order to transmit their communications to a person and not just a building - it just so happens that the Royal Mail's service isn't a hand-to-hand service but the postal system is still accessible after that initial delivery to help get it to the correct person.

Altarf

vetfred wrote: »

In answering the question about opening letters addressed to a previous occupant, the Postal Services Watchdog says: "Under the Postal Services Act 2000, a person commits an offence if they open an item of post which they know or reasonably suspect has been correctly delivered to the address - but addressed to a previous occupant."

It would appear that they need to read the act again as it clearly does not say that.

vetfred wrote: »

Prior Acts such as one from 1953 (along with later ones) stated it was an offence to open mail addressed to someone else or to impede or prevent its delivery to the correct person. In the 2000 Act's explanatory notes in relation to 84 (1), it says this newest Act: "amalgamates the content of offences previously included in the Post Office Act 1953."

And in schedule 9 the whole of the 1953 Act is repealed so no longer has any relevance.

vetfred wrote: »

It also, just as before, has provisions for the people who can be deliberately opening mail not addressed to them.

You are correct. Provided that you either interrupt the mail whilst it is being transmitted, which is not happening in this case; or intended to cause detriment by opening the letter, which unless you are intending to steal the contents or use the contents to do something wrong, you are not.

vetfred wrote: »

Taking the Regulation of Investigory Powers Act 2000, it states "It shall be an offence for a person intentionally and without lawful authority to intercept, at any place in the United Kingdom, any communication in the course of its transmission by means of a public postal service." That Act describes postal items as something in writing "used by the sender for imparting information to the recipient" and not information just sent to an address.

Which is pretty much a standard definition of a letter, but does not mean that a letter is still being transmitted when it has been delivered. In fact the Act says -

(4) For the purposes of this Act the interception of a communication takes place in the United Kingdom if, and only if, the modification, interference or monitoring or, in the case of a postal item, the interception is effected by conduct within the United Kingdom and the communication is either-

(a) intercepted in the course of its transmission by means of a public postal service or public telecommunication system; or

(b) intercepted in the course of its transmission by means of a private telecommunication system in a case in which the sender or intended recipient of the communication is in the United Kingdom.

So once the Royal Mail has popped it through your letterbox, they have finished 'transmitting' it, and the Act stops being relevant.

vetfred wrote: »

Although many things in whatever Act will be open to interpretation into whatever we want them to be, to me the intentions of the Act you linked to are quite clear. Along with the information Royal Mail gives out on this to customers or employees (of which I have been one and perhaps you or others here have too) and the Watchdog, I'm more than happy to be thinking it is wrong to be opening other people's mail deliberately - whether any prosecution would come of it is probably incredibly unlikely anyway since one can always say they did not reasonably suspect it wasn't for them or whatever.

You are correct, the Act is quite clear. It is wrong to open any mail before it has been delivered. Once it has been delivered it is wrong to open it if you intend to do something bad with it. It is not wrong to open delivered mail if you do not intend to do something bad with it.

vetfred wrote: »

One could deem delivery to an address as the end of the postal item's transmission in the postal service, whereas the post also includes the redirecting facility to actually get the letter to the intended recipient.

The redirection facility is to a different address, not to a person. I cannot say to the Royal Mail, "please redirect my mail to wherever I happen to be today".

vetfred wrote: »

After all, people use the postal system in order to transmit their communications to a person and not just a building - it just so happens that the Royal Mail's service isn't a hand-to-hand service but the postal system is still accessible after that initial delivery to help get it to the correct person.

People may want a person to person service, but all the Royal Mail offer is a person to address service. If you want a person to person service then you need to use a different mail carrier.