Transfered all our money into wrong account

[swimmer55]

First time poster, just had a panicked call from my husband, he has transferred all of our savings in to a new account at a new bank (its been sitting in a current account for a couple of years gaining no interest so now interest rates are rising slightly we decided to transfer), by transposing 2 numbers it has gone to a strangers account, the bank are on it but have said it will take up to 24 days and there's a possibilitythey won't be able to return it, has this happened to anyone else and what was the outcome ? Its all of our savings so we are panicking!

I don’t know why, but your husband seems to be lying to you. It really is very difficult to transfer money to the wrong account / person like that these days. The bank goes through an automated process of verifying the account name and number before proceeding.

What really annoys me is that big people like banks and councils have paid money in error to random people in the past, and they had no trouble recovering the money back. Even been able to press charges for theft when the person has spent it.

An ordinary person sends money in error and their money is pretty much gone and nothing can be done.

Really pisses me off how it’s one rule for one and another rule for another.

Sadly I too feel that there is something fishy going on here...

I know someone who had money wrongly sent to their account and it caused them no end of hassle.

they were in their overdraft and their bank were massively obstructive about the return because “they didn’t have the funds”.

It took weeks to sort. And left them on pins because they were on benefits and the amount was one that would cause trouble if it was seen in their account.

it’s not always as simple as folks just not sending it back.

My sister’s had a sum of money transferred into her account and she has no idea where it’s from. She’s phoned the bank and all they’ll tell her is the bank that the payment originated from but not the name of the person or company. She’s moved it to a safe place and is trying to ignore it assuming that someone will come along and ask for it but it’s already been a couple of weeks.

The longer it takes for an update, the more I fear that a previous poster was correct and there was something fishy/amiss.

Apologies for delay in updating,its my first post so completely lost the thread. 100 per cent sure this is whats happened, I've witnessed the calls back and forth between the 2 banks, still not resolved but it does still seem that it hasn't gone into an actual account, each bank is asking for the other to recall/send it so hopefully it will be sorted.Just such a stressful few days, its a lot of money.

Poor you! Hope it gets sorted soon. for the stress??

Hi, this happened to me. Except I was the accidental recipient of someone’s savings. 18 thousand pounds landed in my account one day and it was a nightmare to sort out. Turns out it was someone who had bought something from me years ago and hadn’t deleted me as a payee on their online banking app and transferred it to the wrong person. I obviously informed the bank and they set about trying to solve the mystery but in the meantime all my cards and accounts were frozen while they investigated. Worst 3 months of my life. Hope you get it sorted quickly!

Sorry with everyone else, don't believe it, you have to. Enter the amount, account its going to and name of the account holder, if the name doesn't match the account it won't let you send it. Years ago yes but not now. Unless you are saying he sent it to a random account and they conveniently had the same name. I had to try 3 times last week because I had spelt the name on the account I wanted to send to one letter differently.

Checked my bank to see if I was the lucky recipient of OPs mistake, unfortunately not.

I always double check and check again to be extra safe when sending any amount of money, whether it's £1 or £10'000

My bank verfies every transaction and matching account names it would have come up not verified which is very handy these days

I do this, I’m very cautious when I do a BACS transfer for first time to new person including myself. I opened a Marcus saving account for myself a few months ago…first transfer £1 .. only takes an extra couple of minutes

Yes it is difficult unless you ignore messages. I am getting very fed up with tradespeople who give me their detials but clearly not everything is precisely the same as the banks detials. I spend 20 minutes playing trying to guess the variation of what they’ve given me vs the banks records. Then have to message them to explain, then they seem to be so “fuzzy” …if I’m lucky it’ll go through on 2nd set of detials they send. But once I had to ask them to check 3 times as it kept failing. You’d think they’d want their customers to pay them🤦‍♀️

I once made an error of this sort and someone I knew had a contact in the banking sector who was able to tell me if there was a bank account matched against that sort code. Thankfully there wasn’t. I know that for chaps payments the bank won’t let it go through immediately unless the payee name matches the bank details. I’m not sure if it’s the same for bacs? What a stressful time for you OP, I really hope you get your money back. Keep pressuring the bank.

This. Too late for you, but might help someone else.

I have always sent a tiny amount first to a new account to ensure I have the details right, then the full amount. This is why.. I'd never do a small test amount first.

Not all other banks are part of this and so it is not always possible to check even if the bank you bank with yourself is

That should read I'd never transfer anything without a small test amount first..

I'm amazed it went through, particularly if the account he transferred it to doesn't even exist. Did he do it online? It shouldn't have gone through in first place so keep on at the bank.

The bank can just recall the payment if it hasn't gone to a person. They can also do it on the SWIFT system if it has gone to a person also but that's more complicated.

I worked for HSBC and I could do this on the system. I got in big trouble once (nearly lost my job) because a elderly lady called having been scammed for like £6k and she was crying and upset, and I just recalled the international payment on the system 😂 dropped back in her account within 2 hours.

I had a disciplinary for it, but I have no regrets, poor lady was so upset. I took the hit, it was morally worth it. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Not only most banks verify that account and names match but for first payments, many banks now require a banking code telephone authorisation.

Yes it doesn't add up at all. I had to do a transfer to HMRC yesterday. Had to put the details in and it came up with all the correct details. I then got a text message with a code sent to my mobile that I had to enter into the account to make the payment. Before I pressed send all the correct details relating to their account were displayed again . I had to tick another box to say I had checked they matched the details I had. It's very, very difficult to send money by mistake.

FFS. Only on Mumsnet could someone jump to this.

Whilst you do get asked a couple of times, there are plenty of accounts where the details don't match, despite being the right account. Small differences in business name details, for example.

I'm like this, I do £10, then £100 then still fret about a bigger amount.

I know people are saying you can check the account number and name match but not all banks do it, I moved some money to a higher paying account a couple of months ago and they didn't have the checking facility. It wasn't one of the big high st banks but then they aren't the ones with half decent interest rates.