I transferred some money a couple of weeks ago at 1.1480 using a company I have used just once before, Synergy Exchange.
On both occasions they made mistakes but were both sorted because of my personal connection to the man I made the deal with, and many times at a different company in the past.
I checked my French bank online and all was ok, the 11,480 euros was safely there. Looked again this afternoon for a totally unrelated reason and low and behold I see that a 2nd transfer of the same amount has been made.
I will wait and see what happens but I think it is no surprise that I will not be using them again.
It could be my money that goes astray the next time.
If this is an error (as seems highly likely) it’s very similar to something I recently experienced. I immediately messaged the sending UK financial institution and insisted they take immediate steps to recover the amount paid in error to me in France asap - and at their expense. It took two or three weeks for them to stir into action, and I had to arrange for the amount to be transferred back myself.
I would assume David’s responsibilities are to a) not spend the money, b) to await instructions from the currency brokers as to the return of money (that is not David’s) and c) to cooperate and authorise the return of the funds after b) above. I gather a mistaken payment is called a “paiement indu”.
I will call my man tomorrow and then see how they want to rectify it, but it will be back to TorFX the next time. The problem there is that my UK bank only allows £1,000 a day and thus it takes a week to transfer which by then the rate may have dropped. On this occasion I was taking advantage of personal contact to guarantee the rate at the outset and then spend 10 business days transferring it. With TorFX I don’t have that available and make a different deal every day, which can be an advantage if the rate goes up but the opposite if it goes down, but at least in such a case I can pull out any day I want.
For sure let them know. Sooner or later an internal control at the Financial institution will pick this up and its best you are seen to have told them.
Mind I would then have acute concerns using them again in the future as this sort of thing should not happen.
Yes, exactly my thinking. This time the money had not been transferred by a week after settlement day. I rang my friend and he sorted it straight away blaming a cock up over my destination bank.
A year ago they did something similar, a mistake which should have been spotted and corrected in the agreed rate. Again I had to resort to a personal call. I like the bloke and appreciate his quick action but it shouldn’t be allowed to happen. With TorFX it is all done online, no phone calls and the money is in my French bank the same afternoon, always.
You can get into a lot of trouble here if you receive money in your account that is not rightly yours in the first place and the onus is on the account holder to report this error immediately to their bank or to the people who sent the transfer. You cannot simply ignore it and spend it as it will catch up with you and then you have to pay it back most likely with interest and could be charged with fraud.
It depends. In the UK if circumstances are such that you reasonably didn’t notice and the money is not chased up by the sender then you get to keep it.
