ANZ has begun paying A$70 million to around 230,000 customers, refunding them for mortgage interest rate deductions that the bank failed to pass on, or compensating them for over-charging on home loan accounts.Payments range from a few dollars to tens of thousands. The refunds follow a four-year review of its accounts, after customers' complaints were aired in 2010.A bank spokesperson wrote in an email that some mortgage customers "may have been overcharged interest as a result of promotional discounts not being applied or offset accounts not being properly linked."
The bank said it reviewed 2.4 million accounts.ANZ said it had notified ASIC at the time.The errors included not paying full credit to mortgage accounts that had offset provisions, so the customer was overcharged or there was a delay in crediting the account.