Bought new car - Could the car sales person be syphoning money from our account

Akabusi

The problem is as follows (Mods I think this is the appropriate forum but if not please move): My wife bought a new car in January on PCP finance. We sold her existing car privately which covered the first 33% of the cost. The car dealership sorted out the PCP finance for the other 33% and the car was bought. In February she noticed that an extra payment of approx. 38 euro was taken from her account in addition to the agreed monthly payment. What brought her attention to it was that the name of the benefactor was the actual sales person who she had been dealing with and not the car dealership as is the case with the standard loan amount. While she thought it strange she put it down as being something to do with the service cover. The next month only the standard amount was taken but in April and May these payments to this sales person were back. She contacted the sales person in question and they said they knew nothing about this and were not getting any money into their account and couldn't understand what was going on. She then contacted her bank to enquire about it and they confirmed that the money was going from her account to the sales person's account. She told them that she didn't authorise it and the car sales person is denying that they received it. They said that they would look into it which brings us up to yesterday when we received a letter back from the bank saying that it was a chip and pin transaction and was nothing to do with them under some European legislation and that if she wished she'd have to pursue it by other means.

A couple of things to:
The sales person never had her debit card but would have gotten her bank account details for the finance application. How can the bank then say that it was a chip and pin transaction.

She is upset with the bank as money has left her account on three occasions that she has not authorised yet they haven't offered to change her card or pin. She feels her account is compromised.

The letter states that she can pursue this by other means - I take it that this means going to the Gardai. We will if we have to, but we are hoping that this is some mix up and not anything sinister - would it be possible that this sales person is taking money from peoples accounts without authorisation?

She is going to ring the bank today to try and get a proper explanation for their decision to do nothing. They are fond of charging fees the least they could do was confirm they'd block any more payments going out of her account to this account

Mr. Incognito

Write a letter to the bank outlining

1. These payments were not authorised and you wish to open a formal investigation into them
2. No further payments are to be authorised to that beneficiary
3. Replacement of chip and pin card as it is compromised.

Copy the letter to the Dealership as ask them to explain these deductions.

Do not make any allegations as they could be defamatory. Just stick to the facts.

foggy_lad

First thing to do is go in to your bank branch! tell them to cancel all those unauthorised charges on your account and tell them that you want a new card and pin. If they refuse any of these reasonable demands regarding YOUR account and money tell them you want to make an formal complaint about them. ask for details of how to complain to their head office and the financial services regulator.

then go to the Gardai and report it as theft, give them your statements showing the payments to the salespersons named account. Get a crime/pulse number from the Gardai before leaving the station!

Give the crime number to the bank and then inform the dealerships head office that you have reported the theft from your account and give him the crime number.

NewCorkLad

Banks have fraud departments for investigating these situations. Contact them tell them you did not authorise these transactions and you want it investigated and your funds returned. There is no need to go to the Gardai yet as that would just slowdown the process.

Mr. Incognito

foggy_lad wrote: »

First thing to do is go in to your bank branch! tell them to cancel all those unauthorised charges on your account and tell them that you want a new card and pin. If they refuse any of these reasonable demands regarding YOUR account and money tell them you want to make an formal complaint about them. ask for details of how to complain to their head office and the financial services regulator.

then go to the Gardai and report it as theft, give them your statements showing the payments to the salespersons named account. Get a crime/pulse number from the Gardai before leaving the station!

Give the crime number to the bank and then inform the dealerships head office that you have reported the theft from your account and give him the crime number.

If you go to the Guards then the bank will say that this is a criminal matter and they cannot investigate until the criminal investigation has concluded.

Expect to be waiting years as a result.

Copying the Dealer is adequete. If there is pilfering going on by one of their employees it's a serious matter that they will be able to contact the guards about. I wouldnt be reporting it just yet. You have no evidence that anything untoward has happend, only that there appears to be suspicious activitiy.

Akabusi

Thanks for the replies. Yes we will keep it between the bank and the dealership for now. She contacted the bank since and they took her details again and have said they will get back to her this afternoon. She is also going to contact the dealership manager and let them know what is happening