AFCA had found that Commonwealth Bank has no liability to compensate a customer who contended medical costs incurred overseas were the result of the bank mishandling payment instructions.
In September 2018, while resident in the United States, the complainant contacted the bank to transfer US$10,000 from his Australian bank account in order to purchase a US$8000 motorhome in the US and provide some additional funds.
The transfer request took over two weeks to process and, before it did, the complainant told the bank he no longer required the transfer as he had arranged to finance the purchase through alternate means.
The complainant alleged that as a result of the bank’s delay in transferring the funds, he was caused stress and inconvenience and admitted to hospital with significant medical conditions.
The complainant argued the bank should pay his hospital bill and ongoing medical costs.
The bank accepted there was an error inputting the payee account details after they were received from the complainant. However, it says this did not disadvantage the complainant and there is no causal link between the input error and the complainant’s hospitalisation.
The transaction was identified by the bank’s fraud department as a possible suspicious transaction and placed a hold on it. The fraud team completed its checks and lifted the hold on the transaction two business days after the transaction had been submitted for processing.
“The delay due to the fraud investigation was not unreasonable” AFCA wrote in its determination.
“There is no evidence the complainant’s medical conditions and hospital admission was caused by the time taken by the bank in respect of the funds transfer” AFCA decided.