Wrong Check Number in IBAN

juliewooly

Hi, hoping somebody can shed some light on this. I am buying a holiday home in the ROI. I paid a booking deposit to the estate agent of 1000 euro. That sale fell through and I am now buying another so I requested the money back, the booking deposit is refundable so no problems there. I asked the estate agents to pay the money into my solicitor's ROI bank account rather than send it to my UK sterling account as the Halifax would shaft me on their crappy interest rate and fees.

To cut a very long story short I discovered the estate agent has made a mistake in the check number part of the IBAN number of my solicitor's bank account, instead of entering IE02, they used IE08. The rest of the IBAN number is correct. Checking up on the algorithm of IBAN numbers I know the IE is the country code, 02 is the check number the next part of the IBAN are letters for the bank's initials (AIB) then the sort code and account number are at the end. I am guessing that the money could not have been deposited into another bank account as it is only the check number that is wrong.

Both the estate agent and my solicitor bank with AIB in Donegal, different branches but same bank. I tried speaking to AIB in Dublin and a branch in Donegal to find out where the money would have gone but got absolutely nowhere. One customer service adviser insisted that the money would have bounced back into the sender's bank account (it didn't) and that the check number "means nothing" - which sounds like absolute bull to me, it must mean something otherwise it wouldn't be used. The estate agency has asked the bank to look into it but, well, no offence to Donegal folk but they don't have any sense of urgency, which is partly the reason I am buying there, the nice laid back lifestyle but not much help when trying to get something done. I'm panicking a bit as it is a substantial sum of money that I cannot afford to lose.

Can anybody shed any light as to what a check number does and what could possibly happen to a payment with a wrong check number? I'm guessing that it may have gone into a suspense account or something.

Archi_Bald

Whether you are panicking or not probably won't make much difference. If you have a contract with the Estate Agent under which you can get your deposit back, it's just a matter of waiting until they return your money.

JuicyJesus

The check number shouldn't make many odds since as you say the account details are the same.

Realistically what the receiving bank say is correct. The funds should, theoretically, be either applied to the right account as per the rest of the IBAN or be returned. The check digit's purpose is for validation - it does mean something, as it's trivial for banks to validate them before sending, but for your purposes it doesn't really matter, and neither bank can really be blamed for acting on an instruction given to them even if that instruction was incorrect.

You can try raising a formal complaint, but were this in the UK then you would be complaining as a payment service user, rather than a customer; I don't know if the regulatory system in the ROI allows this. Beyond that, all I could suggest to do is sit tight.

juliewooly

I would have thought that the AIB online banking system would have blocked the incorrect IBAN when the estate agent sent the payment, but it accepted it and debited the account. It definitely didn't reach my solicitor's account and wasn't returned. It's been over a month now since it was sent, bloody annoying as I am signing contracts this week and need the money to complete the sale.

mgdavid

is the new purchase with the same estate agent?
If it is then surely you can make it clear to them that it is dependent on them rectifying their previous mistake, thus giving them an incentive to sort it out.

juliewooly

No, the new purchase is with a different estate agent unfortunately

JuicyJesus

juliewooly wrote: »

I would have thought that the AIB online banking system would have blocked the incorrect IBAN when the estate agent sent the payment, but it accepted it and debited the account. It definitely didn't reach my solicitor's account and wasn't returned. It's been over a month now since it was sent, bloody annoying as I am signing contracts this week and need the money to complete the sale.

AIB should be able to put a trace on the money from their end. That is a very long time for the funds to have not been returned.