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Never ever wire money without second-channel verification of the destination account. You can lose all of it with no recourse.
by joncp 7y ago
Never ever wire money without second-channel verification of the destination account. You can lose all of it with no recourse.
- parliament32 7y agoWires can be reversed in most circumstances, especially in cases of fraud, although it's a bit painful and can take some time.
- ksaj 7y agoCan you describe the process? As far as I've known, up until the moment the transfer occurs, the bank can indeed reverse it if they are suspicious. But the moment the other bank accepts the transfer, it is game over, and the delivery is complete and permanent.
- parliament32 7y agoThe UCC[1] requires that wire transfers are reversible for 60 days, although only in very special circumstances (only fraud and bank error basically). The receiving (beneficiary's) bank is on the hook for collecting the money back from them. In cases other than fraud and bank error, the timeline and process depends. Basically ask your bank really nicely, they'll ask the receiving bank really nicely, and if everyone agrees with your reasons (and the money is still there) you'll most likely get it back. There has to be a way to reverse wires, otherwise if the teller fat-fingers an extra zero onto the end of your requested amount you'd be SOL. [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uniform_Commercial_Code https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uniform_Commercial_Code
- ksaj 7y agoThanks for the description and the link. I recall being told bank criminals typically used transfers because they couldn't be reversed once completed - especially if the transfer went overseas. Maybe it came from an armchair expert, or confusion over the old Swiss numbered accounts, and just became "common knowledge" from there.
- Nextgrid 7y agoDepends which ones. UK Faster Payments are pretty much irreversible; now the law says that it’s illegal to keep money not addressed to you (if someone fat-fingers the account number for example) but it still doesn’t mean the transfer can be magically reversed; if you take out all that money immediately there’s nowhere to get the money back to reverse the transfer; your only option is the law which won’t work for an actual attacker who’d use a hacked account, stolen identity or money mule’s account.
- ghostpepper 7y agoI wonder why it wasn't possible in the case linked by the article[0] [0] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/wire-fraud-email-condo-sale-1.5358363 https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/wire-fraud-email-cond...