International ATM Transaction Failed / Timed out - No Money Dispensed, but Gone from Account

boondocksaint on 26/11/2018 - 07:53

Hi all.

We came back from Bali a couple a weeks ago. Did a lot of research, but there was one issue that we overlooked. So on 3 occasions during our trip, when trying to get money from an ATM, the transaction just timed out and no money was dispensed by the ATM. On my statement and my balance however, the transactions appears and that money is gone.

I have already logged a dispute with my bank and because it was an international transaction, it can take up to something like 45 days. The issue is however, they say that there is no guarantee that I will get my money back, but they don't actually tell me why.

Anyone want to share their experiences? What are my options if for some reason I don't get my money back from my bank? What should I have done differently?

Thanks!

Financial

Comments

  • altomic on 26/11/2018 - 08:01
    +2

    on 3 occasions

    I have travelled quite extensively in my lifetime and can not recall a single time when an ATM timed out and I didn't get my money.

    wait to hear back from your bank and then go from there.

    • boondocksaint on 26/11/2018 - 08:04
      +3

      We have traveled a bit in the last couple of years as well, and this has never happened to me either. Although very few, there are some examples online, but I did not find an example from Australia. Although the other international examples received their money back, I was taken a back a bit by the fact that they said there is a chance I will not get my money back.

      • Imhereforcomments on 26/11/2018 - 08:59

        Happened to me once in Australia. I went to withdraw $20 or $50, I can't remember exactly and no money was dispensed and it disappeared from my bank account. I called Commonwealth straight away gave them the details and they were able to verify it some how. Transaction was reversed as credit to my account within 20 minutes.

        • [Deactivated] on 26/11/2018 - 10:55

          Was the ATM your banks?
          This is pretty straight forward.

          If the ATM isn't theirs, it takes a lot longer, more so if the bank is overseas.

        • lainey13 on 27/11/2018 - 00:24

          The banks know how much money goes into the ATM and how much is dispensed out (ie what is still remaining). They can then reconcile that with the number of transactions since the last fill.

      • Baysew on 26/11/2018 - 11:00

        I was taken a back a bit by the fact that they said there is a chance I will not get my money back.

        Better to give you a heads up rather making a promise that they might not able to keep.

  • bonezAU on 26/11/2018 - 08:05
    +4

    You should have had internet banking on your phone, and immediately after you suspected something might not have gone right, checked the account transaction history. Taken a photo and the exact location of the ATM, any codes/location ID's that are usually somewhere on the ATM or the wall behind it, then called your Australian bank as soon as possible to report it. SIM cards are cheap as chips over there, worse case scenario you could have found some WiFi and used Skype or a VoIP provider to make your call back to your bank.

    Don't wait until you get back to Australia and then check your statement.

    I have family in Indonesia and I travel there twice a year, I've had plenty of bad experiences and it happens all the time to the locals. The tin can and string wires that go back to the phone exchanges drop out mid transaction and you have to be on top of it immediately. If you're waiting till you get back to Australia and then checking your bank statement, you either don't care about money or are placing way too much trust in the ATMs over there (or both).

    Depending on the outcome of the investigation your bank does, you may or may not get your money back, I can't answer that, but good luck.

    • boondocksaint on 26/11/2018 - 08:11
      +1

      No my money means a lot to me. There was a whole different interesting scenario with our sim cards that I don't want to go into here. So I could not actually check at that stage. Again, this is not something I have ever came across, in cases when a transaction has ever failed on me, there was no money gone.

      The first time, I had to use roaming to call the bank that was 2 days after it happened. The second time was a day after it happened, and I called from Australia, as it was on our last day there. I go the same response on both disputes though. My bank did not give me any other instructions or help on what exactly I SHOULD do when this happens.

      So yeah, like I said, this kind of ATM issue was never even on my radar from the research I did going over there. If taking photos etc is the way to go, then I guess I'm stuffed, as I did not do that. I only have the locations marked on google maps where it happened.

      • bonezAU on 26/11/2018 - 08:18

        Don't worry too much about the photos thing. Can you remember which bank's ATMs you had issues with? There's a general rule of thumb if you want to stick safe, stay with the big banks.

        BRI and BCA are the largest and generally the most reliable, followed by Mandiri.

        Try for those three when possible and you should be okay, if you just start using some random shonky looking ATM named after something you can barely pronounce then it may explain what happened.

        • boondocksaint on 26/11/2018 - 08:24

          After the first mishap, I checked online etc, and we only used BCA, Mandiri and BNI from then on. The second time it happened it was on BNI, should have sticked with BCA, never happened on their ATMs. Luckily they have limits on the some of the ATMs as it could have been a lot worse

          • bonezAU on 26/11/2018 - 08:33
            +1

            @boondocksaint: Yeah, agree. I tend to always favour BCA where possible as I've never had any issues, my wife is still a BCA customer even though she has lived here for years, and can speak the language if shit hits the fan.

            Another thing she's drilled into me over the years is limit the transactions to smaller amounts to lessen the impact if something doesn't go right. If you need AUD $1000 in Rupiah, just because the ATM says you can get a max of $300 at a time, break it up into say, transactions of $150, or go to multiple ATMs and make a few $100 transactions at a time

            They are netorious for running out of money when you've finished taking your Rp. 800.000 and you only want 200 more.

            Of course being on this site you wouldn't be paying any fees per transaction now, would you? Since you're not, it doesn't matter how many transactions you break it down into.

            • boondocksaint on 26/11/2018 - 08:38

              @bonezAU: Yes, no extra fees, so we could break it down :) we only did $100 transactions at a time, and paid via EFTpos where possible after that, as those are quickly fixed by the bank as per their advice. At this stage I'm our of pocket $300, which is a lot of ozbargain deals I just nullified.

              I will update the post once I hear something back

              • bonezAU on 26/11/2018 - 09:17

                @boondocksaint: Rp. 100.0000 at a time is very wise. It's a bit of a pain when you need Rp. 100.000.000 (aka $1k AUD) but you risk losing much less if something does go wrong.

                I'd be keen to know how you go with your bank.

            • bluesky on 26/11/2018 - 19:00

              @bonezAU: Good idea - about breaking up into smaller transactions. Never occurred to me before.

      • HighAndDry on 26/11/2018 - 10:15

        I don't want to pile on, but:

        Did a lot of research, but there was one issue that we overlooked.

        You did a lot of research except for cash and phone sims?

        Okay, all snark aside, that is really weird. I've never had any trouble getting cash out of Bali/Indonesian ATMs or the timing out thing - was this at a really remote location? I've really only ever gotten cash out of ATMs in fairly large towns/cities.

        • boondocksaint on 26/11/2018 - 10:35

          Thanks for that :)

          No, the cash research we did. However, I did not see anyone have the issue that the ATM would time out, money gets deducted and you end up with nothing. This is even though we used "safe" ATMs. None were isolated or dodgy looking. One was in the main road in Ubud, ATM station with 3 different ATMs, and one was on the main road in Seminyak inside a big 7/11 type shop.

          Sim cards we researched as well, of course. We bought sim cards, only for them to stop working a day after. We were told, it is because we need to register our passports with the sim. I tried to ask locals about it, we got a load of different BS from different people. So I just figured, screw all of you, I Will use wifi at the hotel and other hotspots if and when needed.

          • HighAndDry on 26/11/2018 - 13:41

            @boondocksaint:

            So I just figured, screw all of you, I Will use wifi at the hotel and other hotspots if and when needed.

            Hahaha yeah. Again - that was just me being a bit snarky, I don't personally expect everything (anything?) to go to plan when visiting either, no matter the amount of research. It just seemed really unfortunate that two major considerations managed to fail for you on your trip.

            In other issues, banks have been pretty good, especially CBA, so I think it'll just be a bit of a wait for it, but you should see the money.

          • farknos on 27/11/2018 - 09:54

            @boondocksaint: not sure about the sim card bit, i have always grabbed a sim when in Bali and never had an issue other than running out of credit and needing to top up.

  • Ocker on 26/11/2018 - 08:16

    The breed miniature monkeys in Bali that are placed into the back of the ATM machines to intercept the cash as it is counted out, and before dispensing.

    • c64 on 26/11/2018 - 09:21

      must have forgot to feed them their bananas

      • Seraphin7 on 26/11/2018 - 11:42

        Monkeys gotta pay for the bananas.

  • Donaldhump on 26/11/2018 - 09:29
    +1

    Happened to me in China, I got the money back about 20 days later. There is not much you can do so just give it time.

    Life sucks sometimes.

  • battler on 26/11/2018 - 10:29

    Off topic, but my experience in India recently. ATM rebooting Win7 with my card locked inside!
    Lucky I got the card back. I didn't proceed with a transaction, went to another ATM.
    https://files.ozbargain.com.au/f/72/64272.jpg?h=b6442ff2

  • [Deactivated] on 26/11/2018 - 11:51
    +2

    It happened to me in Cambodia. Same story, 2-3 errors on one machine, bank statement shows the money was withdrawn all those times.
    Called the bank weeks later at home. Money appeared in my statement about 3-4 weeks later. You just have to monitor your statements as they might not inform you of their findings, based on my experience. Don't panic, you are overthinking, put that worry in the forgettory box for now. These machines have timestamps to audit if the money was really withdrawn.

  • John Kimble on 26/11/2018 - 12:28
    +2

    Not always possible, but going forward, try to withdraw from ATM attached to bank branch during business hours so they can check and resolve straight away (sometimes).

    • bluesky on 26/11/2018 - 18:57

      Yes, I always bear this in mind. Another issue I heard can happen occasionally is when the ATM swallows the card and not give it back. I prefer not to leave my card behind, so another reason for ATM attached to bank with personnel on hand during business hours. Haven't occurred to me yet - not sure if they can in fact open the ATM machine and give my card back - or does it have to wait for specific ATM machine team, so not immediately - but higher chance of getting it back, I guess.

  • Brendoo on 27/11/2018 - 16:44

    I had similar happen to me, but at a Commonwealth Bank ATM in Sydney. Luckily the machine was attached to the bank and it was business hours so I went inside the bank to let them know.

    They told me this sometimes happens and I need to wait until the next day because they can only open the ATM after business hours. They told me sometimes the mechanism inside can have errors and if it couldn’t dispense the money fully it goes into a holding bay inside the machine. They also told me they know the exact electronic transactions that took place at the machine and what the cash balance should be and they will count it.

    By the next day I got my money credited back to my account.

    Not quite the same scenario as you. But if the ATM was attached to an actual bank branch then next time go inside the back and let them know.

  • boondocksaint on 31/01/2019 - 16:52

    Update
    Ubank reversed all transactions.They mentioned that if the banks in Bali finds something different after their investigation,the reversals could be reversed again.Kind of crazy,but anyhow,Im happy until further notice.

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