The story:

- I made a deposit of $800 (cash) on my checking account using an ATM machine.

- 20 days later my Bank debited that ammount twice (-$1600). 

- I called, argued and they told me it was a mistake and that they
will credit my account.

- 3 days later they gave me a credit only for $800, I called again and
they told me that they'll give me a temporary credit and my account
has to go to the investigation department and after this they will
inform me the results and I will have access to all the information
and copies of any document that will lead them to give me an answer.

Their 1st answer:

- About 30 days later I received a letter requesting me to send the
copy of the "check" I deposited, I called and asked about it. I said
that the deposit had been made in cash. They told me that I should've
gotten a different form.

- After at least 1 hour of talking, waiting on hold and arguing this
person, trying to see what form was needed and where they'll send it,
he told me that he could see the final answer I was going to receive
in his computer. I shouldn't wait for an answer and/or a different
form.

The final answer

- Their conclusion was that they were not able to find the envelope
with the deposit and therefore my account would be debited for the
temporary $800 they had given me.

Their "EXPLANATION"

- I called and requested the copies of the documents and any
information that they could provide related to this "investigation"
(again, talking, waiting on hold, being transfered, etc) finally they
told me that there were no papers at all from this investigation.

- Their explanation was that everyday their ATMs are supposed to have
a balance and that specific ATM where I made the deposit was $800
short that day and there was no envelope with that ammount of money. I
asked if they checked the cameras and videos, I asked if their
machines are capable of counting the number of envelopes that were
deposited that day, I bacically tried to ask every possible question
that will justify their action and they didn't do any of those.
Apparently they just checked their computers and balances and since
that machine was $800 short and my deposit was for $800 and in cash,
then I'm one to blame and charge for the consequence.

- They told me that they have thousands of ATMs and they just could
not do what I was asking them to do. They suggested I should go to
that local branch and share my problem with the manager, they gave me
the phone number and told the there was nothing else they can do for
me.

Please help

- I don't really know what else to do, I'm 25 years old and I don't
have the money to hire a lawyer or knowledge in how to fight or
proceed in this type of situation. I don't mean to inspire simpathy
but not being from USA and or familiar with this situation I'm
clueless

The real question

Whats the best thing for me to do, as individual, considering I can't
hire any lawyer or waste time fighting with managers that won't give
me an answer and at the end I might end up losing more that what I've
lost already.



The only reason why I don't want to give this up, it's because I did
the deposit, I don't have any reason on why to lie and not afraid of
any investigation from the bank. They did the investigation but their
answer doesn't justify their action, they don't have anything to
demonstrate what they are saying, I have the receipt, I'm willing to
pass a lie detector, anything, but it's my word against this huge bank
(I'm not even sure if I should say the name, I dont know if this is
common, or if saying their name will cause any other problem)
 
Please help.

Dan.

p.s. forgive any spelling or grammar mistake, English is not my native language

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Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 23 Jun 2005 07:25 PDT

Sorry to hear about this problem.

Your best course of action may well be to file a small claims suit in
the county/city where the bank has its ATM.

Small claims is generally pretty straightforward.  You can handle it
on your own, without a lawyer, and it can be an effective means of
getting your situation resolved.

The mere fact of your filing will probably bring the case to the
attention of higher ups at the bank, and they may decide to rectify
things by properly crediting your account before it ever goes to
court.


If not, then it will be up to you to make your case before the judge,
and up to the judge to decide.

If you need details of how small claims works in your area, let me
know where you (and the ATM you used) are, and I can post that
information as an answer to your question.

Good luck,


pafalafa-ga

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Request for Question Clarification by leapinglizard-ga on 23 Jun 2005 10:23 PDT

You might like to get a consumer advocate involved. Many metropolitan
newspapers have a columnist who helps with problems such as these on
behalf of readers, making inquiries at no charge and reporting the
results of his investigation in a column. This brings a degree of
public scrutiny that can often make recalcitrant or uncaring
businesses change their mind. Since yours is such a serious and
unusual case, the odds are good that your local newspaper's consumer
advocate would take an interest. If I were in your shoes, I would call
the paper and find out if they have anyone like this on staff.

leapinglizard

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Clarification of Question by hodamari-ga on 26 Jun 2005 09:29 PDT

Thanks a lot for all the comments and suggestions, it really helps a
lot. I definitely have a better idea of what to do now, either alone
or with a lawyer or make it public. thank you very very much

---

Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 26 Jun 2005 09:59 PDT

hodamari-ga,

On behalf of all those who posted remarks here...you're welcome!  

No one has yet actually answered your question, and you have not been
charged a fee.  If you feel the question has, in fact, been answered,
you may wish to let us know which of the various comments were most
valuable to you, and invite that researcher to post their remarks as a
formal answer.

Whatever your decision, though, here's wishing you all the best in
resolving your situation.

pafalafa-ga

---

Clarification of Question by hodamari-ga on 02 Jul 2005 02:26 PDT

Hello everybody
thanks a lot again for all the comments and advice, I'm pretty much
ready to send a first letter with a lawyer that i found that will help
me. I am truly greatful for the information. thanks again. I found the
receipt from the deposit made on that day so that will help a lot,
besides that  I don't know what else to ask.
I'm having a very hard time deciding who should post the comments as a
formal answer cause they are all very helpful to me so i'm going to
have my friend the lawyer review the comments and invite 1 to post
their answer, Thank you so very much again.
Dan.

I would find out who the president of the bank is and then get his
Phone number. Call the bank and insist on speaking to him. Although it
is unlikely
you will be put through to the president, you may get someone in the
president's office. Explain your problem to that person.
I understand that as English is not your first language this may be a
little difficult for you to do. However you will get the attention of
the upper
management who might be more willing to resolve your problem.

The suggestion of the two researchers are excellant (Pafalafa and
Leapinglizard)  If my suggestion does not work you should certainly
pursue the researchers' suggestions
Good Luck
DPRK007

I would write a letter to the president recapping the whole history of
the problem and ask for immediate resolution. In my experience,
putting things in writing is imperative. If you don't get a
satisfactory response to your letter within a week, I'd follow up with
a call to the president. If still no response, I'd take the actions
recommended by the others. Another possibility is to have a lawyer
write the letter for your. That would probably grab their attention.

First, I agree with czh-ga
- you must keep an immaculate paper record
- in a curious way, that is a form of evidence, even if it is notes
while on the 'phone.

The good news is that they deducted $1600 when there was only an $800 shortfall

This demonstrates gross incompetence.

I'm not so sure about writing directly to the president/CEO, I did
that once and it turned into a scrap. My paid lawyer advized me to
sue, and my unpaid (but cannier) lawyer said that they could not
afford to lose the case.

However I would adopt a nastier strategy, find the appropriate
manager/VP or even your local bank manager, write to him, but CC a
copy to the president or even better both him and their legal
department.
Make sure that it is clearly CC, not BC.

Another tip, talking on the telephone is not much use.
Even though most conversations are voice recorded, people forget that.

A letter is better.

You'll get your $800 back
- and also a nice file of correspondence, which will be useful if you
have any later problems with the bank.

As a hint to others, I also suspect that you have a case for libel and
defamation, but personally I would not push that.

From a legal perspective, there is nothing you can do.  That said, the
suggestion of filing a small-claims suit may prove viable and may
result in you getting your money back, but if the small claims court
hearing examiner / judge goes by the law, you must lose.  When you
open an account at virtually any U.S. bank or financial institution
that offers ATM services, you sign an agreement which expressly
provides to your virtually unconditional acceptance of the bank's
count regarding ATM machine deposits, withdrawals, transfers or other
transactions.

To give a little background on how an ATM deposit is processed and to
answer a few of your questions, yes, the vast majority of ATM machines
to stamp a numeric identifier onto each deposit envelope inserted into
the machine.  The following business day, the ATM machine is opened in
the presence of at least two bank officials, specifically designated
for this routine task, in an environment which also contains
surveillance cameras.  Additionally, there should be a hidden camera
in either or both the ATM machine or the lobby where the machine is
located.  However, these images are routinely deleted after a certain
period of time -- perhaps in as short as 30 days, but usually longer.

Now, when the two (or more) bank officials process the deposits
received by the ATM machine, they should check for sequential
numbering of deposit envelopes and not any irregularities in their
log.  In addition, if they do get an envelope which purports to be a
deposit of a certain amount yet the stated amount is either over or
under the actual amount they find in the envelope, they will manually
make changes to the affected account holder's account to adjust the
transaction to reflect what they actually found in the envelope.  The
deposited envelope should be retained by the bank for their
investigative records.

The whole process is designed so that there are minimal chances for
bank employees to defraud either the bank and / or bank customers. 
Besides, you have signed a legally binding agreement when opening your
account to accept the bank?s accounting decisions regarding ATM
transactions.  Unless a careful investigation reveals a mechanical
malfunction in the ATM machine or outside illicit tampering or that
the bank employees who processed the ATM receipts erred, your recourse
is, for all practical purposes, nil.

Actually, from the bank?s point of view, it is not uncommon for
customers to fraudulently claim ATM deposits in inflated amounts or
that never happened.  This is especially common with bank ATMs that
automatically and immediately credit a customer?s account for an ATM
deposit prior to the bank verifying the deposit in question.  I am NOT
saying that you tried to defraud the bank or that you made a mistake
in the deposit transaction.  I am only telling you what the process is
and not only the banks\?s view on the transaction, but also the legal
status.

If you did actually make said deposit, then you should push for
reimbursement.  By taking them to small claims court, you may force
them to investigate the incident more closely instead of their
automatically believing fraud and, as a result, find the truth of the
matter.  However, if you did not really make this deposit, you should
tread very, very lightly as the bank would be well within their rights
and ability to bring criminal charges for fraud.

Did you get a receipt, the number on the receipt correspondse with the
number printed on the deposit envelope and with is electronically
transfered to the banks auditing logs. I have seen this happen and one
thing that I do know is never deposit cash in an ATM, the banks see
scams like that all the time and for the ones that really get shorted,
it becomes a nightmare.

The bank should have supplied you with an electronic transaction
identification number. You should have or had it posted on you account
around the time you made the deposit. I know ATM machines, I have
worked on them. The accountibility on these things are pretty strict.

1. If you made the deposit, you used your card to gain access.

2. In order for the ATM to complete the transaction and give receipt,
you must have put something in the deposit pull.

3. If the ATM is like 99% of the ones that I am familiar with, then
when the ATM accepts the envelope, it prints the transaction
information directly on it.

4. If this happened then the bank know full well that something was
accepted from you.

5. If they are reluctant in any way to counter the process an ATM
follows to maintain high security and accountibility for both
themselves and the customers then something is really corrupt at your
branch.

6. Lets say that you made the deposit but the envelope was empty or is
was a peice of junk mail, so hypothetically you are trying to scam
them. You woudl have received notice that your deposit was incorrect
or something along those lines.

7. Whatever was put in there was recorded and either they have
whatever you put in there or they dont.

8. This is the wonders of technology at work in the financial
institutions and no matter which two ways this goes, you are entitled
to whatever you claim was in that envelope. I will give you the
specifics in a bit.

9. Whatever was put into an ATM, there is a 100%, not 99 or 98, but
100% guarranty it will be taken out. The banks must match every
transaction, funds out funds in, inquiries, failed accesses and so on.
But the 2 main protocals they must follow are the funds. When they
physically go in to retrieve deposits, they print out the report from
the ATMs system. They have a tally that is mandated by the FCC, FDIC,
Federal Trades Commission, Federal Reserve and so on. On that day they
must have verified something or else they would have never posted the
deposit.

10. The second check comes when they verify the ATM log with thei
branch servers, the protocol on this is basically a talley and
verification of what the ATM says it gave up matches the banks
records. The ATM doesnt do anything but escrow the package. When you
entered into your account using the ATM, you entered the banks systems
therefore your deposit was posted. Again, if the ATM log matches the
the items they received and they verified that log with their system
then something was deposited.

11. No for the cash issue. Again, at the time the teller verifies with
the banks systems, they must verify the contents contained within the
package. So now, unless they contacted you next day that there was a
problem with the deposit, and assuming they followed proceedure, then
it is without question that 800 in cash was in that envelope.

12. It is very uncommon, let me rephase that, a bank will never delay
a transaction that they claim never happened, for 30 days. At the most
they would go 1 week, without notification, just to check and recheck
the problem. Something is definitely suspicious about your "lost"
transaction.

So here is the knock out punch for you. Sure you can go to small
claims spand 45-75 bucks, wait 3-6 months and find out that you cant
sue a bank for what has happened. Banks are protected by the federal
government hiding under some kind of law that basically immunizes the
institution form cash claims brought to suit by a member of their
bank. Its more a scam because it legislates that banks monitor
themselves and their customers and the government monitors them and in
the case of untraceable transactions i.e. cash you fall into this one
in a million things that cant make a bank liable. But it isnt the end
of the world. Even though they advise you that they are not liable for
cash deposits made at an ATM, they are still accountable for the
transaction.

Bottom line, if you pressure them in fast-tracking this paperchase,
which they should be able to do while you wait, but more then likely
they will take their sweet time, talk to the manager in private and
tell him that you will take that bank to court. send a cerified letter
to the regional manager. If you have your receipt make copies and send
your complaint to the above mentioned government institutions. You can
do all of this in a day. Show the manager the cerified letter receipts
and a copy of your complaint. He will probably move on this. Tell him
what you know now about how an ATM works and that you suspect a teller
of theft. I wouldn;t dought it if he credits your account until this
matter comes to a conclusion.

Just remember, they know everything that happens when it comes to
money and they can follow the trail to the ends of the world and back,
but unless you fight them, they not budge just because they know what
they are doing. So that is the reason you have a case against them.

In summation, if they followed procedure to the T, then they have no
choice but to grant you the 800. Otherwise, they didn't follow
procedure and someone will have to explain why the transaction was
verified and out of the blue just disappeared.

I hope this helps. If you need expert advise on ATM machines and need
to talk to a manufacturer or ATM techs to testify on the security of
the machines, call deibold or go to their website.

Good luck.

P.S. wait until the banks open next time. Money is always safer in possession.