mistake in bank transfer - now saying the money has been redirected.

kenny608uk

So this is one of my last resorts, I need some advice cause i'm reaching the end of my tether.
on July 9th I made a transfer from my Lloyds bank account to what was meant to be my other Lloyds account, but mistakenly made a transfer of £400 to an account with Santander that no longer exists (closed/dormant). I immediately reported it Lloyds who filled out a "payment made in error" form and said it may take 20 days, but no guarantee it'll be returned.
No problems I thought, since both accounts are mine I'll contact Santander and speak to them.
I call Santander on the 11th, they say that they'll open a case on their end and we'll go from there.
I go back to them on the 14th after getting a text to say the case had been closed.
The advisor informs me that the case was closed and all the notes say is "there was a redirect on the account" and nothing else. He informs me that he'll reopen the case and that it'd probably take another 5 working days for a response, at this point i'm a bit frustrated but I get off the phone. I finally get the chance to call them again on the 19th of July, and this time I go to their complaints department, explain everything thats going on and the rep puts me on hold while she looks into it. At this point we find out that another account i had with them that I mistakenly believe had been closed actually had a small debt attached to it (that I wasn't aware of in the past 5 years since I'd left that bank) So we go to their collections department, and the lady there is very understanding that this was a mistake and the money was not intentionally paid, she sets up a payment to return the money within 5 working days. Great! I think.
Fast forward to today (25th July) and nothing in my account. so I go back to santander and they explain that because the account had been in debt for so long it was in review, along with the money i'd accidentally transferred. and that it may take another 28! working days to complete. At this point I was very upset, I explained that I was now having to borrow money to get by because my money was tied up in all this "processing" that all happened because for some stupid reason they redirected the money from my dormant account to this debt. Now I went through all this with another rep from their complaint department who explains they cant do anything till tomorrow because the departments closed at 5pm.

Now I'm stuck, It's almost 3 weeks since this happened, I'm broke, borrowing money to get by and a little bit scared.
Any advice?

Shakin_Steve

The bank may be reacting slowly, but.....you did make a mistake in sending the money to an an account you closed which was then redirected to an account you mistakenly believed was closed. Hardly an everyday occurrence.
Santander are notoriously obtuse when dealing with customers when things have gone wrong. I, personally, believe it's a throwback from when they had to merge their IT systems with Abbey and A&L.

jonesMUFCforever

Any advice??

Go through your list of payments and delete all old or obsolete ones.

YorkshireBoy

Shakin_Steve wrote: »

you did make a mistake in sending the money to an an account you closed

Several mistakes in fact.

Firstly, OP initiated a "payment" (to an external account), when they should have initiated a "transfer" (to an internal account).

Secondly, one of these was called "Santander" and the other was called "sort code/account number" (residing at Lloyds).

Thirdly, they failed to check/find the error at the confirmation screen.

Fourthly, a "payment" requires a password, whereas a "transfer" doesn't. Alarm bells should have rung.

The onus is on Lloyds to help return the payment, not Santander...normally. However, the issue is clouded by the presence of a debt owed to Santander.

In short, OP is at the mercy of Santander investigating, taking what they're owed, and then returning any balance. I think this will run to 4-8 weeks.

kenny608uk

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

Several mistakes in fact.

Firstly, OP initiated a "payment" (to an external account), when they should have initiated a "transfer" (to an internal account).

Secondly, one of these was called "Santander" and the other was called "sort code/account number" (residing at Lloyds).

Thirdly, they failed to check/find the error at the confirmation screen.

Fourthly, a "payment" requires a password, whereas a "transfer" doesn't. Alarm bells should have rung.

The onus is on Lloyds to help return the payment, not Santander...normally. However, the issue is clouded by the presence of a debt owed to Santander.

In short, OP is at the mercy of Santander investigating, taking what they're owed, and then returning any balance. I think this will run to 4-8 weeks.

Well on the first point, my transfers to my own accounts happen under the same menu as payments to other accounts (on mobile anyway) and I didn't even know that I still had this account saved on there at the time. and secondly, none of them are named by the bank the account is with. and thirdly, no, Lloyds doesn't require a password to send a payment/transfer.

Also, the Collections person I spoke to agreed that they wouldn't do it that way, as it was an accidental payment, was happy for me to make repayments in my own time, since I was now aware of the debt.

kenny608uk

jonesMUFCforever wrote: »

Any advice??

Go through your list of payments and delete all old or obsolete ones.

Yeah its on my list of things to do once this is resolved.

Uxb

On the PC/laptop/desktop browser version of Lloyds on line banking it certainly does ask you for your password to be input as part of the process of making a payment to existing stored payees.
...as well as warning you to check that the payee data being used really is correct.

On the desktop versions an inter-lloyds transfer between your accounts does not require a password to be entered.

If you were say transferring from Halifax to lloyds (ie the same group) then the payment has to go through the full authorization procedure including passwords on the desktop version however the actual payment happens instantly so obviously stays "in-house" and bypasses the Faster payments system - and indeed the screen tells you this.

I've no idea about the mobile version which indeed might be different.

kenny608uk

Uxb wrote: »

On the PC/laptop/desktop browser version of Lloyds on line banking it certainly does ask you for your password to be input as part of the process of making a payment to existing stored payees.
...as well as warning you to check that the payee data being used really is correct.

On the desktop versions an inter-lloyds transfer between your accounts does not require a password to be entered.

If you were say transferring from Halifax to lloyds (ie the same group) then the payment has to go through the full authorization procedure including passwords on the desktop version however the actual payment happens instantly so obviously stays "in-house" and bypasses the Faster payments system - and indeed the screen tells you this.

I've no idea about the mobile version which indeed might be different.

yeah the app doesn't, along with the transfers to internal accounts and external being under the same screen. I'm not denying I made a mistake. I'm just frustrated that 20 days seems to be the minimum and neither side is able to give me information without directing me to multiple departments.

agrinnall

kenny608uk wrote: »

Also, the Collections person I spoke to agreed that they wouldn't do it that way, as it was an accidental payment, was happy for me to make repayments in my own time, since I was now aware of the debt.

You'd better hope that call was recorded because I wouldn't be surprised if they turn round and say that accidental or not they are taking out what you owe before returning anything. I'd be a bit doubtful that she really had the authority to say that in the first place.

eskbanker

Given that you owe Santander a small debt, have you offered to pay it all off with the accidentally-transferred money and close down both/all of your accounts with them?

Without wishing to get bogged down in the rights and wrongs of whether they're already entitled to retain enough to cover the debt, I'd have thought that if you explicitly authorise them to settle it then you'd be more likely to get the rest of your money back sooner....

mt99

first of all dont feel bad about making a mistaken payment - it's very common and although i have never 'done it' i have 'nearly done it' a couple of times and i'd bet a lot of people on here have too.

my best guess ut that santander will take the money owing from your £400 and return the rest. Eventually. There is probably not much you can do to speed it up other than call santander every so often and ask when they will return the balance.