A little advice please!

[Digi]

If someone else deposited money into your account you can be sure that the bookie will freeze the account when they see it.

Tell them about the deposit

[joeyboyuk]

Are yopu sure you havnt won some sort of competition/ prize draw? Could happen without you knowing if its a bookie you use a lot

[DoctorGonzo]

Much more tricky at a bookie than if it were a bank account. If it's down as a deposit to the account then there will probably be a 1x turnover requirement (most books have this requirement). If you start betting with it and they notice it's not your cash then they could void any bets placed with it and that could leave you in a bad position. So really you have two options: 1/ Try and withdraw the lot, with the risk of them noticing and taking the cash back, and also the risk of a gubbing. 2/ Ask CS where the cash came from - you might not get a useful answer as we all know how good cs staff are, but as Joey says, you may have actually won some random competition!

I can't really say which option I'd go for, as it depends on the amount and the book, but 2 then 1 is probably the safest option... I certainly wouldn't try to match any of it out though!

[munk]

Hello everyone,

First off I would like to thank everyone here for all of your posts. I guess you could call me a bit of a 'lurker', but with so many people vastly more knowledgable than me here I find it hard to contribute anything new or useful!
I am a student studying a failry intense course which requires alot of my time, but thanks to this forum I have been able to build up enough money to cover my tuition fees next year and a large chunk of rent. I am now trying to use my funds to generate a weekly income. So an honest and sincere thank you to everyone here!

The other thing I wanted to mention in this post is that recently I find myself in a bit of a dilema. Last week a fairly large sum of money was deposited into one of my accounts, and it didnt come from any of my banks. Basicly it is not my money, and it is likely that an error has occured somewhere along the line and someone is out of pocket.

Now, I am studying my second degree, which means pretty much no financial help for living costs or tuitions fees or books etc. The amount of money that has been mistakingly put into my account would really really help my situation. I have left it sitting in the account though incase it was traced and removed again. It has been a week and I think it unlikely that thats going to happen. The problem is, the honest thing to do here would be to declare the error to CS, who will likely take it from my account. So you see I am a little torn; do the right thing and maintain integrity but struggle, or keep the money and and have a large weight taken off my shoulders?
Dumbledores words rumble in my head a little: "The time will come where we will all have to make the choice between what is right, and what is easy"....or something to that effect

So, what do you recon I should do? Thanks in advance! And thanks again in general.

EDIT: grr just read above and loads of posts since I originally read the thread, most of the below is irrelevant then...

Someone posted about exactly the same thing a few months ago but I'm not sure I could find it straight away...

Anyway in that thread I explained how I was in the same situation some time ago, a relative had deposited money into my account (a large amount as well) and bizarrely on the same day a second transaction for the same amount also entered my account but was obviously not from my relative - so 2 lots of payments into my account, both the same sizable amount but I knew only one of them was legitimate.

I contacted my bank about it and the woman on the phone seemed a bit amazed that I didn't want to just keep quiet about it (which says a lot about banks I suppose ... but that's by the by ). I explained I would rather they took it out of my account so I knew where I stood, if they decided suddenly to take it from me randomly at some point in the future then it could mean I incurred charges (if I was close to being overdrawn for example which actually wouldn't be likely but still, was possible).

In the end I think I got an agreement from her on the phone that that wouldn't happen and I was OK just to keep it... probably all a bit informal to be honest and who knows maybe they could have clawed it back at some point, although they never did thankfully (though I do feel a bit sorry for whoever it was they took it from, am fairly sure it was a personal account)!

Also someone mentioned above, end of the day if it's not your money then effectively you are guilty of theft if you know it's not your money but continue to keep it - IANAL but I am fairly sure that is the 'law' in regard to this kind of issue.

All in all my opinion would be to report it to the bank and ask them to either remove the money from your account or confirm to you that they will not take the money from your account in future at random. Something like that anyway.

[tigerelm]

Thanks folks. I dont think it is a competition win because I receieved an email saying my account had been credited from my deposit, which by the way appears to be a moneybookers deposit. Actually its quite odd how this might have happened!

If I do keep it, I think I will give half of it to a charity. But, it looks more and more like I will have to tell CS! Which gets me wondering, even if they dont know where it has come from themselves, they will know that I know its not mine, and will have no trouble taking and keeping said money for themselves. Unless of course someone has already been compensated for the error, then its right they do.

I was hoping for an overwhelming "nooo! dont b daft, keep it and all shall be fine"....wishfull thinking! I appreciate the honesty though!
Cheers

[Stevesharpe]

I'm amazed it's still there if by Moneybookers. I would expect that whoever made the deposit would have informed the bookie it wasn't in their account, provided a transaction number and it would have been traced.

It's not Bet770 is it? They recently paid me out a double 4 figure withdrawal but asked for the duplicate back before I even knew I had it. I was impressed as the request came through Moneybookers and they asked my permission to refund it, rather than just doing it.

[Andy]

Not advice but a true story... (from quite some time ago now)

Three times in the past Casinos have paid me twice by mistake, I dont know how or why they managed to do it but they did. Each time I noticed and said nothing. Each time they wrote to me within a few weeks saying they had noticed they paid me twice in error please return the £s. Each time I replied telling them that I would love to return it but due to anti money laundering regulations I would first have to "Verify" their identity and I required a scan of their Govt Issued photo ID and a Utility Bill less than three months old.

One time some lad who was clearly just "Joe Bloggs" in the accounts department had got up, wandered over to the office scanner, scanned his Driving licence and sent it to me with the words "happy now?". There was no Utility Bill but I thought: Good on him for trying!, and returned the £s.

Did not get a response from the other two, I kept the money, never heard from them again.


It is not advice, and I would not necessarily do the same again but it is what happened then.

[rebuswad]

I'd be more concerned at the possibility that my account had been compromised in some way. So first thing I'd change my password, cannot hurt. If we are talking about >=£100 I would personally let CS know. If you find the amount of money significant to yourself the person that may have lost the money may feel the same. You would also have peace of mind.

If <£100 there is an argument that it's not worth the hassle, as we have probably all found random forgotten or unknown amounts in our accounts at some point.

If it bothers you at all (which I think it does), then let CS know. You cannot put a value on peace of mind, and you may get the cash guilt free.

[tigerelm]

Hi there, incase anyone is wondering what I did, I contacted CS and let them know about the error. Guilt be gone! Also I did change my password just incase
Thanks for your inputs!
Merry Christmas!