To be confused by the rude email

[Farontothemaddingcrowd]

I got married in a lovely church on the 19th and the ceremony was beautiful. 4 days before the wedding we received the invoice through the post with details of how to pay by cheque. The invoice did say that payment should be made prior to the wedding. As we don’t use cheques, dp (now DH) contacted the church treasurer to ask for the bank details. He emailed them over and said that he would amend the invoice. This was on the 16th. DH wanted to confirm the bank details before we sent the transfer over (as a fraud protection measure- as emails can be intercepted etc) so we waited for the invoice to arrive. Nothing further was mentioned and we had the ceremony, a short honeymoon followed immediately by Christmas.
On Boxing Day DH emailed the church as we hadn’t received a new invoice, asking if we could confirm verbally the details for payment. The vicar responded to say that this should have been paid before the wedding and that we could drop cash off at the rectory. DH explained that we had only actually received the invoice on the 15th and we had requested a new invoice as we wanted confirmation of the bank details. As the church wanted payment we transferred the money there and then.

The church treasurer has emailed to say he had needed to ‘calm down’ because he was so angry. He insinuated that we were ridiculous to want verbal or posted confirmation of the bank details and said that he had never agreed to send a new invoice out. He said it was unreasonable that we had taken ten days to pay (those ten days included our wedding, honeymoon and Christmas). He said that his son was Vice President of cyber security for a bank and we did not need to confirm the bank details in an email. His tone was really abrupt and I was really upset tbh, we were happy to pay well in advance, but the church sent the invoice out very late, with incorrect details. We made a payment when WE chased it on Boxing Day and that payment would have cleared faster than a cheque would have done.
AIBU to think we should have had longer to pay an invoice - the invoice arrived on the 15th and we didn’t have the bank details emailed until the day after and we were then waiting for the amended email to arrive. I don’t know if I’ve explained it very well - but I feel like the unnecessarily rude tone, when we’ve now already paid, is upsetting and casts a shadow over a lovely day. DH works for a bank and is probably extra cautious regarding cyber security but I think he was right to ask for verbal or posted confirmation before we sent over a large amount of money.

I’d make a complaint to be honest. They’ll be someone higher up the chain (God maybe?) that you can explain it to and say that the tone of the treasurer was uncalled for and has tainted your relationship with the church. They’re running a business after all. How about some customer service.

Actually, if you're going to be going back to him later asking for your kids to be christened etc, I would send him a bottle of wine and apologise for being a worrier when it comes to bank details.

I think he misread you. He thought you were wedding cowboys, want a church when they need one, won't see them again til they need their children christened to get in to a school. He might be right. He might be wrong. But don't let him sit back and rub his hands together and said ''knew it''. Send him a bottle of wine.

There are some erroneous posts here - some people don’t know how invoice fraud works. But yes, fair enough, we should have made extra efforts to verbally confirm beforehand.

we were happy to pay well in advance, but the church sent the invoice out very late, with incorrect details

Which details were incorrect?

Also, I’m not sure about other banks but when I am sending a payment to a new account my bank runs a search to check that the sort code and account number match the name I have entered as the recipient.

For example I tried to send payment for car repairs to [fix it car company] and it refused the payment so I contacted the garage and it turned out it was under the owners name [joe bloggs] rather than the business name.

I now always make sure I check verbally to confirm before I pay anything new electronically. Can’t be too careful of cyber crime

YABU

You were the ones who wanted to confirm bank details a second time so you should have called them to do so. You knew payment was due before the wedding, it was your responsibility to arrange it.

The treasurer is almost certainly a volunteer, not that it excuses rudeness but it explains why they have better things to do (over Christmas) then resend things in triplicate to you.

Just let it go.

I'm not suggesting it was your intention, but it's quite possible the church think your requests for a second invoice/ confirmation were just delaying tactics so you could pay when it was more convenient. Hence being abrupt.

As an aside, with any smaller organisation or business, if you're expected to pay by a certain future date, it would be the norm to discuss how you would like to do so in advance, rather than after the payment is due.

Yes absolutely- we thought the treasurer was sending a second invoice, which caused the confusion.

What is your relationship with the church? Surely, you know the people involved? So why didn’t you pay as they requested? Or did you just pick the church as a pretty location? YABU not to have paid as requested.

The bank details were meant to be included on the original invoice. They were missed off. That’s what I meant by incorrect details.

I’m mortified that they would think I was intending not to pay!

She didn't have everything necessary. She didn't have confirmation of the bank details by something other than email

She did. It's on the payee to double check the details verbally over the phone, which she didn't do before the wedding. Had she done that, there would have been no issue. Let's not get hung up on reissuing the invoice for the same thing here. She knew how much to pay to whom and by when. You put the payment ref in to identify you and the wedding and you pay. It's really simple.

It’s nothing to do with knowing the people involved. That’s not how invoice fraud works.

'Also, I’m not sure about other banks but when I am sending a payment to a new account my bank runs a search to check that the sort code and account number match the name I have entered as the recipient.'

So does mine

Hopefully your DH would check his bank did too, if he's very switched on with 'cyber security'.

I wouldn't lose sleep over it though you've paid now and hopefully added a nice extra donation to the church

This is one of those occasions where I would just bend over backwards apologising.

His comment that he needed to step away to calm down is an extreme reaction. He LEAPT TO ASSUME THE WORST ABOUT YOU REALLY QUICKLY which would hurt me (I'm too sensitive I know).

I think you should have just paid when you got the details. If it was wrong, you would have the email proof of the stated details and that’s where the money was sent.

You don't understand the problem OP was trying to avoid. When you receive an email, you have no guarantee that the bank details in the email are the same ones the sender sent. If they're not, it means you've paid a fraudster, and proof that you've done that will not stop you having to pay the same amount again to the person you actually owe money to. It won't be their fault you paid into the wrong account, because the email had the correct details when they sent it.

Your husband is right - it's best practice to confirm payment details by a second method of communication. We have to do so at work and have lost over £1000 due to a tradesman's email being hacked and us paying the band account emailed to us.

*bank

Honestly, please don't give this another thought. I was a church treasurer once and the two prior to me were jumped up twerps who I can imagine would have reacted like this. My successor (and me, obviously ) was lovely, so I'm not tarring all church treasurers like this. Just 50% of them, in my very limited experience.

I'm not quite sure of the rights and wrongs of whether you should have made more effort to pay it before the wedding/were maybe a bit over cautious, but it really doesn't matter now. Congratulations on your wedding, delete his ridiculous email and just put it out of your mind.

This actually happened at my work, we sent an invoice, it was intercepted, the bank details changed and then sent on to the client, so it definitely does happen.

However, you could have called and verbally double checked the bank details, or most banks now have a fraud checker where they'll tell you if the details that you are putting in match with their records.

I'd put it down to 6 of one and half a dozen of the other, if you've apologised for the late payment then it's time to move on.

Ideally we would have verbally confirmed but the treasurer led us to think we were to wait for his amended invoice which was being posted. I think there was some confusion on both sides, but I don’t think rudeness is ever necessary.

I wouldn’t worry c it.

They might be annoyed you didn’t chase details earlier, if you wanted confirmation, but equally they didn’t send when asked.

I’d just send a short firm para stating your position and forget about it.

Honestly, nobody died. The invoice was paid. Forget it and move on. I'm not religious but this stuff pisses me off. Not very nice being rude to you and hardly the model of good Christian / catholic / or whatever behaviour x

Explain, apologise and move on?

I work in finance and spend hundreds of thousands a month on endless supplier invoices.

If any of them contact us by email saying they have changed their bank details, then all I do is ring them up using the contact details we already hold, and confirm that the details are indeed correct.

Why didn't you just pick up the telephone?

We have done. I have anxiety so moving on is not my forte!