$16,000 showed mysteriously appeared in the bank account of a friend of mine. What can she legally do?

Question

A mysterious $16,000 deposit posted to a the bank account of a friend of mine about 2 weeks ago. The money is not hers and she does not know where it came from. We figured the bank would recognize the error and withdraw the money. If the bank doesn't find the error after 3 months or so, what should she do? It would be really nice to keep the money, but not at the cost of going to jail for a felony. I was just curious if anyone knew her legal options because I certainly don't want to give her any bad advice on the matter.

Answer 1

Tell her to wait until she gets her next printed statement. If it has not been corrected by that time, she should ask the bank to review her account because she does not agree with the balance shown. Do not mention an amount, date or whether or not it is over or under what she thinks it should be. This should be in the form of a letter or e-mail. Registered letter is best.

It is better to let them trace it. Otherwise she is liable to end up with more than that amount taken out of her account. The idea is to make the bank admit there is an error and ask for the money back. This is for her protection as they obviously don't know what the are doing at that bank.

They should have traced it themselves rather quickly. Whoever it belongs to probably will make some noise.

You never know though, I have a friend that keeps her own running balance for her business in her computer, and rarely looks at her statements very closely because they are so far behind what she is doing. She finally decided to reconcile her books with a statement and found the same thing had happened to her. The bank had given her a credit of $250,000 two years prior, and while they knew they were short, they had no idea where it had gone until she contacted them. At first they said there couldn't be any mistake with her statement. But she insisted they check it out. They never even said thanks for it.

Answer 2

You cannot withdraw more than a certain amount in cash even if you have enough in your account Deposit-wise, new anti-terrorism/anti-money-laundering regulations dictate that £10,000 or higher payments will require to fill in a form basically exoplaining where the money came from Now that the retail banking system is fully computerised, it's likely that the pattern as much as the size of the deposit that will automatically trigger an alarm. If you regularly deposit, say, £5000 in cash because you are a tradesman (builder, plumber etc) and get paid that way, then they may enquire initially, but then you won't be molested by bank staff or customs officials. If, on the other hand, your £800 a month salary usually goes into your bank by transfer (from your employer) and you suddenly start depositing thousands in cash, you know you'll get a call..

Answer 3

It is the banks responsibility to ask for the money back. It is not your friend's responsibility to tell them she has discovered what appears to be an error4 on their part.

Amazing how many people who answered think that she has any responsibility at all. Here are the facts that you have presented;

Your friend has discovered an apparent deposit into her account that she was unaware of.

And that is all. She does not know if a relative put it in or what else might have happened.

If she feels really nervous about it, she should do what the few intelligent people above have suggested. Wait until her next statement or two, then just tell them she thinks they made an error.

Answer 4

Tell her not to panic.

As somebody else said tell her not to do anything until she gets her next statement. Among other things, the bank's computers have already notified the Federal Government that she has had this transaction. They report all transactions except their own over a certain dollar amount. used to be $4,000. So IRS, Homeland Security and other agencies have already been notified.

Let the bank straighten it out or there could be a lot of trouble. Wait until the next printed statement, then notify the bank that they are in error, as suggested above. Make them straighten it out, including a letter stating that she did not have a transaction of that size. Otherwise she may be investigated for terrorism, drug dealing or Lord knows what.

Ignore the idiots saying she has to do something right away. Let the bank straighten it out. Their goof. Their foul. Their responsibility to fix it. She may have to give them permission to withdraw it from her account. Anybody can put money in a person's accounts but they can't remove it without her permission. My guess is that it won't ever show up in her statement because the bank will want to hide it's mistaken deposit and illegal withdrawal so the Bank Examiners don't see it.

Answer 5

Tell her not to let the bank do anything without a written request. As already said by others, she has already been reported by the bank computers as having had a $16,000 deposit. If she just lets them take it out again, she will be reported as having made a $16,000 withdrawal, and chances are very good that her phone will be tapped.

Answer 6

Don't wait 3 months. If the bank EVER discovers the error, and they will eventually, the have the legal DUTY to recover the funds. If your friend spends ANY of the money, she can be charged with bank fraud. There are people in jail as we speak for this very reason. Your friend should contact the bank ASAP and request an investigation into the source of the funds.

Answer 7

hmm...when i see activity that i have not authorized on any of my accounts, it's a pretty safe bet to call it FRAUD.

if it is was so easy for someone to put 16K unnoticed into your account, they can just as easily take 20K unnoticed out...think about that.

a lot of people are saying it's the banks responsibility for maintainig your money (isn't that the reason why financial advisors say that YOU should also keep track of your money just in case there is a screw up at the bank, silly people). how untrue...ultimately, you are responsible for yourself (with your money and life in general). if i were you, i would check an online statement (as most banks offer this for free these days) to see from whom this mysterious money came (just like a CC statement, there is a line that describes where/who/what the transaction was for).

Answer 8

One of my college professors had the same thing happen only it was $1,500. He spent the money. It's the fault of the bank and if it comes up missing they are insured for such things. I'd say transfer the money to another bank account and after a few weeks to months, have fun with it.

It's a shame cause the bank only loses my money. One time they lost over $750 of my money and they couldn't find it. If I didn't have a business, I wouldn't have a bank account. Banks make too many mistakes.

Answer 9

she's gotta tell the bank because sooner or later someone will notice theor money is missing. It isn't like it was found on the street -- there are records of where it come from and where it was supposed to go. DOn't think there is the slightest chance they could keep it - nor the interest it is accruing.

Answer 10

Legally, she can do whatever she wants, she did nothing wrong and I'm pretty sure it is not her legal responsibility if someone deposited a large sum into her account. Don't worry about hurting the bank, they're insured and they've all made huge profits this year.