According to The Guardian, in October 2012, Donaldson (not her true name) skilled a sickening, gut-wrenching moment when she shown that during 2 yrs, every time she had transferred her monthly paycheck of $1,500 from her HSBC account to the joint 1 she shares with her husband at Nationwide building society, she had accidentally been placing the money in a total stranger's account. After 2 years, the amount she had transmitted was roughly $40,000.
"It wasn't until October 2012 that I discovered the £1,000 was not showing on our joint account's monthly statement. Having transfered over to paperless statements in 2010, I had been checking out that my wages were leaving behind my business account held with HSBC at the end of every month. However, to my horror, I now saw they had never arrived in our joint Nationwide account. Scrolling back, the final time my wage appeared on our statement was May 2010," says Donaldson in The Guardian. "I frantically checked my numbers for the bill repayment scheme I had set up with HSBC and also could see that, on setting it up, I was 1 digit out … the money has been going to another Nationwide account holder for the past two years, amounting to £26,650!"
"The payment was set up clearly to my name, my sort code but with one account number digit being incorrect…..Phone calls to Nationwide that night, a lot of tears and numerous subsequent calls and mail, have left us with just £1,000 returned and a complete blank of information from Nationwide," she says.
It might be difficult for Donaldson to get her cash back. According to The Guardian, the recipient refuses to return the cash and the bank cannot reveal his or her identification due to data protection rules. What's more, British law dictates that when money goes into the wrong hands, it can be withdrawn without gaining permission first for up to six years after it's wrongfully transferred. However in Donaldson's case, the recipient had withdrawn the money through ATMs so there is nothing they can do. Shine attempted to contact Nationwide for comment but emails were not returned.
"People have become so dependent on technologies that they've developed a blind trust in computers," says Manisha Thakor, CEO of MoneyZen Wealth Management. "But technology isn't perfect; when you consider the sheer volume of transfers that banks make every day, it's actually very easy for an error to occur. People have a personal responsibility to take ownership of their finances." Here's how to avoid making a similar mistake:
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