Halifax losing Foreign Cheques/Bankers Drafts

TASA

Hello I currently have a case going through the Financial Ombudsman relating to Halifax losing a very large, six figure Spanish Bankers draft I deposited. The case is currently progressing but my question is not really in the Ombudsman's remit.

The circumstances of the loss are very irregular, suspicious. They then somehow damaged the photocopy of the draft they had ensuring they could not process it. Meaning I had no choice but to try and get a replacement draft. This as predicted is proving very difficult

There is a department in Halifax (Lloyds) called The Lending Office that deals with high value foreign cheques, they were constantly changing their version of events and even came out with statements which have turned out to be totally false, dishonest. I thought all of this was bad enough but it was let slip by their complaints department that this has actually happened before with the Lending Office. They seem to have lost foreign bankers drafts and then simultaneously somehow lost/damaged the photocopy relating to it (every branch takes a copy when receiving a foreign cheque). Each time they force the customer into getting a replacement. The odds of both losing the original and the copy must be incredibly high, so to do it repeatedly the odds must be astronomical.

So my question is this. If they are purposely losing or destroying customers cheques/bankers drafts for whatever reason is this a criminal offence. If so would it be vandalism, some sort of theft. Obviously they are not destroying the money itself but the access to it. From what I have researched so far the draft has value and is not just a piece of paper. It is in legal jargon a "thing in action" a valuable security. In destroying the draft they have ensured that I cannot get the money owed to me by the Issuing bank. They have also permanently deprived me of the draft form itself, the physical cheque.

I realise this is a bit specialist and may only be answerable by an experienced lawyer or the CPS but any comments would be welcome.

eskbanker

TASA wrote: »

They seem to have lost foreign bankers drafts and then simultaneously somehow lost/damaged the photocopy relating to it (every branch takes a copy when receiving a foreign cheque).

[...]

If they are purposely losing or destroying customers cheques/bankers drafts for whatever reason is this a criminal offence.

The notion that they're deliberately doing this is pretty far-fetched - any large dispersed organisation handling lots of pieces of paper will inevitably lose track of them sometimes, however valuable they may be.

That's not to say it's right of course, and if/when it happens then they should make good any losses caused by their actions, but even if you were able to ascertain exactly what happened to each copy, there's a huge leap from there to proving that there was a deliberate attempt to deprive you of the proceeds.

So, assuming you have a receipt for the deposit that evidences your passing it to Halifax then you're in a strong position. If getting the original one stopped and another reissued costs you money then they should pick up the tab for this, and offer some sort of compensation for your trouble, and escalating to FOS is obviously the right thing to do if they're not playing ball, but trying to brand Halifax's conduct as criminal is a waste of time and effort....

System

Unlikely to be deliberate but use electronic means (SEPA / SWIFT) and another banking group (Not BOS, Halifax or Lloyds) in future.

TASA

Hi eskbanker
Yes on the face of it I would agree, a big organisation can lose things, it will always happen.
But it is the actual circumstances surrounding the loss and subsequent changing story line, the dishonest statements made by the bank that all raise suspicion. The truth is easy to tell. Even the relevant branches concerned did not understand what the Halifax Lending Office were doing saying it made no sense. The Lending Office also kept their decisions and actions a secret not just from me but also the branch. They adopted a policy of secrecy not telling the owner of a vast sum of money what they were doing and then lost it.
I do not want to get into full details as it is still ongoing but when it is finished there may well be a blog about it.
Also I realise I would probably need a whisteblower to prove anything.
It has been pointed out to me that if a bank forces someone to get a replacement foreign cheque it acts as a level of insurance for the bank against future claw back by the Issuing bank. Maybe they thought it was a fake, fraud, money laundering etc. A foreign Issuing bank can claim back on the cheque for up to 6 years. Hence calling it the Lending Office as they consider themselves lending you your own money.

System

TASA wrote: »

Hi eskbanker
Yes on the face of it I would agree, a big organisation can lose things, it will always happen...Also I realise I would probably need a whisteblower to prove anything.

You are confusing a f**kup with deliberate action on their part.

Your 'big cheque' will almost certainly be small fry as they'll be dealing with corporate payments too.

Apologies if that bursts your bubble.

TASA

Heng Leng it was from a property sale in Spain. The standard transfer of property happens in a Notaries office. The buyers who were Spanish hand over the draft witnessed and copied by the Notary. We sign over the property at the same time. That is how they do it there. The property is now legally the buyers no matter what happens.

born_again

I would never worry about branch staff not understanding what any internal department is on about. Branch staff are in reality order takers and sales people.
They will have no idea, other than maybe the odd procedure that they do not really understand on a internal system to go by.

There is no way any staff member can understand exactly what every department does, or how they work. There are simply too many. With a mass of different procedures.

TASA

Still Dave
At first I just thought this is very very bad luck.Losing the original and then somehow damaging the photocopy. But luckily I had my own copy of the cheque and offered it for processing, they turned it down. Why would they turn it down, surely they would be eager, very keen to immediately correct their mistakes. But no they did not want it, said I had to get a replacement and that was that.
Put yourself in my shoes there, you would start questioning wouldn't you. By this time it became apparent that something they said was now untrue, they had also come out with 4 separate versions of events, it was not adding up.

I have an old friend who works in the financial services industry, has done for 25 years and now has a fairly senior compliance role. So I contacted him to try to find out about this Lending Office that was the cause of it all. As hengleng said the bank gets far bigger cheques than mine but that is the normal run of business for a corporate. It is to do with risk assessment. A large foreign cheque is abnormal for nearly all retail accounts so will be investigated. They will need to decide if the bank can take the risk of having the amount as a potential liability for the next 6 years. So they look at the account/owner like they would a loan or mortgage. Also they have to check for money laundering or fraud. They did say to me that this was not normal for my account, I agreed.
At the time I deposited this, Dec last year, there had just been a spate of fraudulent cheques arrive from southern Spain. Halifax had even mentioned this themselves.The lending Office will sometimes outright reject a cheque and return it, ask for more information and I was told that if they suspect it may be fraud then there would be a motivation for a bank to "lose" it.
I can understand people naturally thinking a bank would not do that but there are so many irregularities in this case and banks will do immoral things. Not that I am saying it has definitely happened it is just a possibility.
Just try to answer one simple question. Why would they turn down my offer of a copy to process. it does not seem logical for a bank acting in good faith ?

Afraid_of_Kittens

This is like reverse bank robbery - instead of a crook waving a gun and stealing money from the bank in this case the bank has stolen money from the customer!

They have to fill the black hole left by all those PPI claims (£26k from Halifax to me) also the staff need funds to pay for their biscuits thry have with their tea and the cost of their Christmas party - so the odd Foreign Bankers Draft is an ideal way to grab some free cash.

I thought everybody knew this?

TASA

AofK I believe you may have £26k of mine, swap for some hobnobs ?

fwor

TASA wrote: »

But luckily I had my own copy of the cheque and offered it for processing, they turned it down.

A bank should never accept a customer's photocopy of anything important - a photocopy is in effect just a photograph of the document and, like any photo, it can be modified with Photoshop or any of a multitude of other image editing packages before being printed out.

As Still Dave implies, it's hard to see what the bank has to gain out of your elaborate conspiracy theory - it seems more likely that they really have just messed up and lost the documents.

When you have your replacement cheque it would be worth sending them evidence of the direct cost to you, as they may be willing to cover that cost.