July 04, 2008
THOUSANDS of people received double their normal paypacket overnight thanks to a processing error at Westpac.
Westpac spokesman David Lording said a technical glitch overnight meant that a batch of payroll and direct debit transactions was processsed twice.
He could not say exactly how many customers had been affected, but said it was in the thousands and involved millions of dollars.
But if you're one of the affected customers don't get too excited - Westpac is already reversing the transactions. Because the money involved payments going into another banks, Westpac has to work with other banks to retreive the money - a process that will continue throughout this afternoon and overnight.
Mr Lording said in the meantime customers should not be tempted to spend the extra money.
"Most people have a very good idea of how much they are paid and if they see there is extra money in their account they should leave the money there."
Mr Lording says this kind of error was very rare, but was unacceptable.
"We apologise to any customers who have been inconvenienced by this incident," he said.
News.com.au
Your Comments:
6 Comment(s)
I have been trying to get $40 from Westpac since Oct 2007... lost faxes and non-returned phone calls is my current experience of this 'service-orientated' bank.
Because in this case it's their money rather than yours.
Why do we have no control in how long a bank takes for your own funds to process, but can rectify any timeframe for it's own benefit?? - Not ours
Because its your fault and not theirs :)
Just like Monopoly - "Bank error in your favour. Collect $200"
How is it that they can retrieve all the overpaid money in a day in a half but if I pay money into a wrong account it takes weeks to rectify??????
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