A Canberra widow was left traumatized after $5,000 was stolen from her ANZ account in a secret Kuwait scandal and bank bosses allegedly refused to act
Canberra man, 61, stole $5,000 from his ANZ account ANZ won’t cancel funds that were pending for five days
A grieving 61-year-old man said a shocking scandal left him in limbo for six weeks while mourning the death of his wife and fearing he would be robbed again.
The Canberra man said he was waiting outside his solicitor’s office to finalize his late wife’s estate last May when he received messages from two of her banks.
Alerted to ‘suspicious’ activity on his Great Southern Bank and ANZ accounts.
When he checks, he finds an unknown thief has spent $10,000 of his hard-earned money in Kuwait, the Middle East.
A Canberra man, 61, had more than $5,000 stolen from his ANZ account last May (pictured, fraudulent transfer).
He told news.com.au, ‘I was going through quite a bit of stress with my wife dying, I was at my lowest point.
Great Southern Bank was able to close the transaction quickly.
However, ANZ allegedly refused to cancel two $2,676.19 transactions taken from the account – despite both still being ‘pending’ when the man discovered them.
He claims ANZ staff said they would only be able to start investigating the case once the transfer from the account cleared.
When asked why the bank could not stop the stolen money from the account, it was because it ‘could not inconvenience the merchant’, he said.
‘They remained pending for five days. All I could do was wait until the funds left my account. I went back and forth with ANZ for five whole days,’ the man said.
He described the bank’s investigation into the incident as ‘six weeks of hell’ and lodged a complaint with the Australian Financial Complaints Authority, which was later withdrawn.
In the end, the Canberran’s funds were fully recovered but he was never told how the thieves were able to obtain his bank details.
The man claimed ANZ (above) refused to cancel fraudulent payments when they spent five days ‘pending’ because it didn’t want to ‘inconvenient the merchant’
He claims that he now lives his daily life constantly wondering when he will fall prey to another scam.
‘I check my bank account every hour. Every phone call I get is suspicious,’ he said.
Daily Mail Australia has contacted ANZ for comment.
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