Cape Town - Standard Bank is not budging on its offer to only refund a client half of the money he lost after his card was cloned earlier this year.
Cape Town journalist and documentary filmmaker, Yazeed Kamaldien from Schaapkraal, Philippi, told the Cape Argus of his three-month battle with Standard Bank after he noticed an amount of R14 937.52 was missing from his account shortly after returning from a two-week trip to Brazil.
He said while in Brazil he had been using a Brazilian SIM card in his cellphone and was therefore not aware of any activity on his account. He arrived home on May 11 and found thousands of rand missing from his account.
“On May 12, I went to Standard Bank to report the money missing from my account. I was told the case would be handed over the card fraud investigation unit and was given a reference number, and told that the bank would get back to me.”
Kamaldien said it was frustrating dealing with the bank as weeks would go by without any resolution.
“I would speak to someone who said they would get back to me but they didn’t. Then I would phone again and the same thing would happen.”.
Kamaldien said shortly before he went to the Claremont branch, where his account is held, to find out the status of the case, he was told by the fraud unit that his card had been cloned.
“They confirmed the money was stolen. I was told they would only pay back R7 500, about 50 percent of the missing amount. I told them I need to get it in writing which did not happen.”
Kamaldien said a Standard Bank consultant then contacted him to say the bank had made a mistake and he would get less than R2 000 back.
“She said this is because I went onto internet banking and I should have let them know if there was any money taken out. I went on to my bank account online on April 30 to make payments. The funds were stolen out of my account after that.
“I alerted the bank as soon as I got home that the funds were taken out of my account.”
He said the consultant told him she would get back to him in writing, for which he then waited more than two weeks.
“I then decided to do a story on the issue and only when I contacted Standard Bank’s media department, did they send me written confirmation that they would refund 50 percent. I told them I don’t want 50 percent but the full refund.
“I want the full refund from Standard Bank and nothing less.
“I have not yet lodged a complaint with the bank ombudsman as I want the bank to pay me back my money that it did not secure.”
Standard Bank spokesman Ross Linstrom said the bank had investigated the matter and remained of the view that its offer was sufficient given the facts of Kamaldien’s case.
“Mr Kamaldien has been advised that if he disagrees with the bank’s findings that he should direct his complaint to the Ombudsman for Banking Services to address his dispute.”
However, Kamaldien remained adamant he would not accept Standard Bank’s offer and vowed to continue his fight to get the full refund.
He has meanwhile already attracted over 25 000 views by Friday from Facebook followers since posting his experience with the bank, which included video clips.
Cape Argus