Funsho Elemo (not real name), a tiler living in Edo State, was told by a United Bank for Africa (UBA) customer service agent to get a court order when he mistakenly sent N632,000 to the wrong account. The money has remained missing.
Elemo told FIJ on Wednesday that the N632,000 belonged to his mother.
“The money doesn’t belong to me, it belongs to my mom. She is using it to manage her business. Because she doesn’t have an account, she uses the account most of the time,” Elemo said.
Elemo’s Disputed Transaction
Since the account involved was also a UBA account, Elemo was optimistic the issue would be resolved swiftly. He lodged his complaint at a UBA branch around Upper Mission in Benin City.
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“Immediately, Blessing (UBA’s customer care agent) asked me for the account number (recipient’s) and confirmed that I made the transfer. She said she would place a lien on the account (recipient’s), but that I should write a letter, which I did. Then, she asked me to go get a court order,” Elemo told FIJ.
“When I was on my way to get the court order, she called and told me that she would try to reach out to the recipient to see if she could get the person’s consent to do a reversal without needing a court order.
“In the evening, she called to tell me that with the way the person responded, she did not think the person would respond. So, the following morning, I went to get the court order, but the order took about two days to be ready.”
The lien is a sort of security that a creditor such as a bank places on a client’s account to debar a debtor from withdrawing from that account until the debt is paid. That was what Blessing from UBA told Elemo the bank would utilise.
When Elemo took the court order to Blessing, she asked him to pay an extra N10,000, claiming it was for a lawyer who would verify the authenticity of the order. Elemo then called a friend to confirm if paying the N10,000 was truly standard practice.
“I have a friend who has worked in UBA before, so I contacted her to know if I had to pay money for the verification. She said no, but that I should go to another branch to confirm,” Elemo said.
“When I got to the other branch, the Akpakpava branch in Benin City, the person I met said he wanted to check the recipient’s account first. He then said the money had been withdrawn.
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“I called Blessing, and she told me that the lien she placed on it was supposed to last a week. I asked her if the bank could remove the lien when the recipient complained, but she said that the bank would have to contact her first before removing what she placed on it. She told me to come to their branch the next day.”
When Elemo returned to the Upper Mission branch, Blessing confirmed that the lien she placed on the account had indeed been removed from UBA’s headquarters. She told him that the only way to rectify it was to blacklist the recipient’s Bank Verification Number (BVN).
“Since that very day at the bank, I have not got any positive feedback from UBA. I have contacted their support team, I emailed them but they didn’t respond to me. I chatted with them on Twitter but they keep telling me to be patient,” Elemo added.
FIJ emailed UBA on Friday but the bank said Elemo should reach out to them by himself.
“Thank you for contacting UBA, Customer Fulfillment Centre. This is to acknowledge the receipt of your mail. Kindly liaise with our customer to contact us for further assist. We sincerely apologise for the inconvenience experienced in this regard,” UBA’s response email read.
The post Edo Tiler at UBA’s Mercy After Sending Mum’s N632,000 to Wrong Account appeared first on Foundation For Investigative Journalism.