wise bank scam : help court action

[echat11]

Sar for what account the OP or the recipient of the money?

The SAR will show that the OP contacted Wise within 15 minutes, I'd get the evidence from them, then make the complaint.
They can't then say, the OP didn't alert them. I don't expect the account number to appear in the SAR.

Organisation like to protect themselves. How many times have we seen that?

[JK2054]

Wise aren't disputing that though.

The problem is that they didn't get a response from the third party bank so the timing wouldnt have made a difference and I can't see the FOS saying anything different.

[echat11]

The FOS are 'wishy, washy' in how they make decisions, how they look at T & C's, the information you provide etc (something that is so blatantly obvious, which they will try to push aside). At times there is no 'rhyme or reason' for the way they decide things.

[JK2054]

I agree with that to an extent, but its because terms are often reviewed circumstancially.

The other problem with goign to the FOS is it will take approx a year, which will delay any legal proceedings he may issue.

[helphelp786]

Hello, here is an update.

Firstly, a reminder of events:

1. We sent over 100k to the wrong recipient whose last digit was incorrect.
2. Within 12 minutes, we informed Wise.
3. The wrong recipient is also a Wise customer, and Wise had the power to freeze the amount.
4. I understand Wise needs the consent of the account holder to withdraw, but at least they could have frozen it as they were controllers of both sender and receiver. The receiver in this case was the wrong recipient but also a Wise customer. There is no third-party bank involved; all this is happening under the nose and eyes of Wise, and all parties are Wise customers. Wise can see and check all transactions of all senders and wrong recipients.
5. Surprisingly, Wise emailed us that the funds had not gone to the Wise balance but to a third party, which is demonstrably wrong. Later, it was confirmed that the wrong recipient is also a Wise customer. This shows their lack of interest in timely action.
6. Now they have replied: "You contacted our Customer Support to inform us about this issue, and the agent sent your case to the relevant team, who contacted the recipient in an attempt to resolve the issue. Unfortunately, the attempt was unsuccessful. Wise does not have the ability to be involved in disputes between senders and recipients, so we strongly recommend that you know and trust the person or business that you are sending to before setting up a transfer or sending any money. According to section 13.3 and 13.4 of our Terms of Use: 13.3 You must provide correct information to us. When setting up your withdrawal request, you must ensure that the information you provide is correct and complete. We will not be responsible for money sent to the wrong recipient because of incorrect information provided by you. 13.4 What happens if you provide incorrect recipient information. If you have provided incorrect information to us, we may, but are not required to, assist you in recovering your funds. We cannot guarantee that such efforts will be successful as they rely on the policies and practices of other banks and institutions. In addition, Wise may not be able to confirm that your recipient’s name and account number match, as the names and other information associated with third-party accounts may not be known to Wise. This means that if you provide an incorrect account number, your funds will most likely go to the wrong account."

The issue is this:

6. They failed to realize the wrong recipient is their customer and they have access to it promptly. Had they done so, they would have noticed the name difference and could have frozen the account. There is no third-party bank, so recalling funds was just some clicks away for Wise.
7. When the payment reached the wrong recipient, we received an email stating that our funds are with Mr. ABCDF. So now we know the name of the wrong recipient, and of course, we have account number details, but we don't have their address to sue. We asked Wise bank, and they are saying, "Regrettably, without a legal request, we cannot disclose additional recipient information."

The question is, what do they mean by legal request? Is it a court order? Or a lawyer letter? Please help.

[PallasAthena]

The question is, what do they mean by legal request? Is it a court order? Or a lawyer letter? Please help.

Ask Wise - any opinion here is just guessing.

[atticus]

Has the OP still not consulted a solicitor?

[echat11]

Have you sent a SAR yet?
Did you not say you were speaking to a solicitor in an earlier post?
Also you've just told us now that you had an email with a name, previously you said that you only had an account number.

[JK2054]

i doubt a bank will do something because a solicitor asks.
solicitors are just ordinary people in reality.

[helphelp786]

Could someone please tell us how to make a subject access request? I thought you can only make subject access requests about yourself. We want to find out the address details of the wrong recipient.

We now know the wrong recipient's name as we received an email from Wise stating that our funds have been successfully sent to Mr. ABCD after the transfer was made. We don't know the person personally, and, of course, we have his or her bank details as we sent them by mistake.




"Just a little update: we have formally lodged a complaint with FOS again, and we've found a good case similar to ours as well. We haven't involved a solicitor as the order for disclosure in the High Court quotes £7,500 plus VAT at least. We are relying on FOS for now to take action. Here are some points of our complaint to FOS:

Furthermore, in the decision by Ombudsman Jane Hingston, Financial Ombudsman decision number DRN1687194 (https://www.financial-ombudsman.org....DRN1687194.pdf), it was held that "It is not in dispute that the original error giving rise to the problem was made by Ms. P, not by Barclays. But Barclays provided a payment service to Ms. P and had a duty to take appropriate steps, in a timely manner, once it was told about the mistake. The account into which the money was sent appears to have been largely inactive, with a small balance, and so the large mistaken credit is very conspicuous even at first glance. I agree with the adjudicator that, since Barclays had both the sort code and the account number that the money had been sent to, it should have been very easy for it to quickly identify the mistaken credit. I accept that, in some cases, the question of whether or not the holder of the beneficiary account is entitled to a disputed credit is not clear-cut. The situation is also more complex if some or all of the money has already been paid out before the mistake is notified. But I find that this was not such a case. In my view, the error was clear and demonstrable. Barclays would not have placed itself at any material risk by ring-fencing the money so that it was preserved for the estate. In all the circumstances of this particular case, I am not persuaded that Barclays was powerless to prevent the holder of the beneficiary account from drawing out the mistaken credit, as it suggests."

Therefore, in our case, the wrong last digit input and mismatch of names, with both the wrong recipient and sender being Wise customers, and Wise having control over all accounts in question, have not acted fairly or fast enough. Wise could have done more to recover the funds as it had the power to do so being the controller of all accounts in question, and they could have frozen at least the amount in question, in this case, xxxx amount if they couldn’t freeze all of the wrong recipient's account pending further investigation. Instead, after 3 hours of complaint, they replied that the funds have gone to a third-party bank, which is demonstrably false. As a reminder, both the sender and the wrong recipient were Wise customers. Also, as a reminder, Wise was informed less than 12 minutes after the transfer was made [EXHIBIT A].

[atticus]

A SAR is a request for your personal data held by the party of whom you are making the request.

Here is a link to this site's template request: https://legalbeagles.info/library/gu...ccess-request/

I cannot see how an SAR will help you. What you need to do is take legal action against the recipient.

[echat11]

A SAR won't provide the address of the recipient (or at least it shouldn't).

A SAR should at least provide information of how events 'unfolded', until you get the information
you won't know how helpful it will be.

Example, you say you sent Wise an email and called them within 15 minutes after the transfer,
that will be on Wise's systems, you can show the FOS that is the case, but Wise didn't act in your
interests when it could and should of done, especially taken into consideration the amount involved.

Maybe it will show that they didn't try, how helpful will that be as evidence in your FOS case?

[echat11]

A SAR is a request for your personal data held by the party of whom you are making the request.

Here is a link to this site's template request: https://legalbeagles.info/library/gu...ccess-request/

I cannot see how an SAR will help you. What you need to do is take legal action against the recipient.

The thing is he doesn't know where the person lives, may not have the first name, which jurisdiction he lives in. He won't get any help from the Courts here as they won't entertain a Norwich Pharmacal order.

[atticus]

that is not the OP's personal data! It is someone else's.

[echat11]

that is not the OP's personal data! It is someone else's.

Yes, some else. If it's a 'unique' name it would easy to track down the person on planet earth.

But if it's 'run of the mill', then not so easy.