BoI bungle hits 60,000 customers

01-04-2005

by Charlie Taylor

Bank of Ireland has apologised to customers after a technical error led to payments being issued twice to a large number of personal and business accounts.

Ireland's second biggest bank admitted on Thursday that a mistake had occurred which resulted in electronic payments made on Tuesday being repeated the following day. These duplicated payments went through instead of ones that should have been processed on Wednesday. The bank admitted that the blunder had affected both debit and credit payments.

BoI estimates that the error has impacted on approximately 130,000 transactions, affecting some 60,000 customers.

The bank said in a statement that the mistake occurred as a result of a "technical difficulty" when processing payments on Wednesday evening. Bank of Ireland has now commenced a full internal investigation into the matter to ensure that the error does not reoccur.

The bank also say it is now in the process of correcting the mistake by reversing the duplicate payments and ensuring that those not processed on 30 March are now put through. The bank has said that it will ensure that there are no fees or interest implications for customers as a result of this error.

Any customer with queries should contact either their Branch or the bank's helpline.

Ironically, the bank admitted its blunder on the day that legislation aimed at giving customers more protection against financial services was enacted. The Investment Funds, Companies and Miscellaneous Provisions Bill 2005, was published on Thursday by Minister for Trade and Commerce, Michael Ahern, TD. The bill contains a small number of amendments which increase the level of fines imposed on parties found guilty of breaches of consumer legislation.

Moreover it also comes a day after it was announced that the Irish government is to make further moves towards automating social welfare payments by switching to e-payments. As reported by ElectricNews.net on Wednesday, the Department of Social Welfare's methods of paying customers is being reviewed and of the options under consideration by the department is direct payment to customers' bank accounts via electronic fund transfers (EFT).