In The News: Did CBA Lose $90k or WTF Is Happening?

TL;DR
Young couple reckon they have lost $90k.
Commbank reckon they never had $90k.
Couple have statements and screenshots.
Commbank say the numbers don't match their records.

Audio:

4th September

‘No answers’: Major bank bungle leaves a young couple $90k out of pocket

5th September

Neil Mitchell provides update on Commonwealth Bank debacle involving young couple

Video:

5th? September

Young Melbourne couple mysteriously lose almost $100,000 in savings after buying dream home

Text:

4th September

Commonwealth Bank blunder: Victorian couple lose $90,000 before bank sends link to suicide helpline

5th September

Commonwealth Bank of Australia hits back after redacted claimed bank lost $90,000 life savings

Couple claim they've lost nearly $100,000 after savings 'mysteriously disappear' from bank account

6th September

The four questions that need to be answered about Commonwealth Bank 'missing $90,000' mystery

Commonwealth Bank have spoken out after a Melbourne couple claimed they lost $90,000

7th September

New claim surfaces after couple claim CBA lost $90k of savings

New claim surfaces after couple claim CBA lost $90k of savings

Commonwealth Bank couple's 'missing $90K': Family of Melbourne pair hit out over bank record debacle

New claim surfaces after couple claim CBA lost $90k of savings

8th September

Commonwealth Bank mystery $90k: How young couple's campaign for answers about what happened badly backfired - as loved ones share their theory about what happened

9th September

Commonwealth Bank mystery $90k: How young couple's campaign for answers about what happened badly backfired - as loved ones share their theory about what happened

Mental health concerns for couple who lost $90k after media campaign backfires

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Comments

  • Whirlpool format spotted

  • +5

    Wheres the poll?

    Smells and reads like fraud to me, cba should sue them for deformation if proven they were trying to con the bank

    Shit sauce as well, dailymail as reliable as current affair

    Also as if someone who holidays in baaaaaali for the cheep cigggis, has 96k, the 0.75c balance is more accurate

    • +5

      cba should sue them for deformation

      CBA a bit bent out of shape?

    • Most organisations cannot sue for deformation/defamation and CBA is certainly not one eligible to.

    • -1

      I typed out a poll but then i chickened out and deleted it. Wasnt sure of the options to put vis a vis defamation law

    • Shit sauce as well, dailymail as reliable as current affair

      Also seven, herald sun, chronicle…

      Dailymail is 127 years old.

      A Cureent Affair is one the last bastions of local news

      • Age doesn't make Dailymail any less tabloid trash. and a current affair a bastion of local news? I assume this is just jest or sarcasm right? ACA is well and truly in the tabloid trash bucket, watch media watch a bit and see how often they are called out on there garbage reporting.

        • True, but the point is they are almost the only ones left doing local news at all.

  • +1

    I'd lean towards they are mistaken and commonwealth didn't lose anything.

    • +2

      Mistaken? More like blatant fraud attempt where they didnt bother to do even basic research before doctoring some receipts.

      • +3

        Until that is actually proven I'll stick with mistaken.

        • +1

          pretty hard to "mistakenly" forge a receipt.

    • +15

      You're cooked. The lady was the one who blabbed about this to the media.

      'No money in our account. 75c. And they can't tell us where it's gone, nothing.'

      This is CBA's very rehearsed response

      'The account in question (or any other account held Mr Murphy) did not have a balance of $96,000 (or an amount close to it) at the time of the relevant transfers or the 12 months prior'

      I'm no fan of predatory big banks but these bogan charlatans are at best, sorely mistaken, but also possibly trying to pull a fast one. CBA holds all the receipts.

    • +3

      I negged this

    • If you listen to the second radio report it mentions CBA asked at least her to sign a form giving them permission to speak to 3AW.

  • +2

    It's Deon Hong II… trying to scam CBA.

    • His fake receipt generator strikes again!

  • +7

    Hubby probably blew $96k on pokies. Now faking receipts and going on the offensive. Get Tracy Grimshaw on the case and maybe CBA would cave. They're deluded if they think this childish scheme could actually work.

  • +4

    You can’t just delete an account off the bank system. Each bank have multiple applications and databases that hold the same info. To line up and delete 1 account entirely off cleanly require a project team. It would cost the bank hundred of millions if they get found out why would they do it do it for 90k. Everyday a bank written off that much in bad debts.

  • +10

    Without delving in too much, I work in this sector, particularly in the hosted infrastructure for financial institutions.

    There are so many safeguards and backups done, it would make your head spin. They would have backups going back at least 7 years, readily available.

    Either they are both in on some insane plot to try and scam 100k.
    One of them has spent it(gambling, drugs etc) and can't face the music.
    They somehow have been compromised/duped and were depositing to an elaborate scam set up - least likely.

    I can't really see any other way. Very curious to see if they get to the bottom of this, anything is possible, though.

  • +9

    I wish CBA would hurry up and refer this to the police. It's clearly fraud.

    • +3

      yep, I imagine it is already with their own internal fraud team. Before they refer it they probably want to see how much deeper the pair dig the hole they are in so that they have ample evidence and it isn't a prolonged case.

      • +5

        They're waiting on a response from them. They'd most likely ask for bank transfers to the CBA account or ask for payslips going to the CBA account. With this information they can then liaise with the other banks and catch them out in a lie and that is sweet victory.

    • +2

      I doubt it. They may have to involve legal, IT, Compliance, PR marketing, and senior managers. Not worth the hassle in staff time filing a report. PR could backfire as the framing of the story is on the supposed victim's side

  • +3

    I completely believe this story based on the source links alone…

    • +1

      Yeah, OP has a bit of a history turning "look what I found on TikTok/Daily Mail" into forum posts.

      I don't particularly mind it, I guess it saves us from reading it (in theory?)

  • +4

    Guy spent it on hookers and blow and didn’t tell wife …. Tells wife commbank took our money …. 😏 that will work

    • and gambling

    • +1

      kind of sure this happened, and he cannot back down now…

  • +2

    There must be cash withdrawals or transfers somewhere over time? If they have accused bank of losing money, bank should be allowed to make those withdrawals public instead of protecting their privacy. It rattles confidence in the financial sector otherwise.

    • Banks should absolutely not be choosing to release private financial information to the public… A judge, sure. The bank? Absolutely not.

      • CBA asked her to sign a form granting then permission to speak to 3AW radio station. Its not clear if she did and or if he did seeing as it was in his name. But i assume thats why CBA have been able to make the public statement they have.

  • +1

    Sounds like they're trying to 'scam' the system

  • +2

    Spent it on online betting, lost the whole lot and made up a story to wifey…. instead of owning up he's dug himself a hole he cant get out of.

  • +4

    I don't believe them. But, it should still be investigated thoroughly - if it's deemed that they are acting fraudulently then the couple should be held accountable for not only the fraud, but the time and money that they have cost the bank.

  • +1

    Surely all is needed is the evidence of how the money was put into the NetbankSaver account. Everything else is just pointless noise.

    If it was supposedly cash deposits, then yep, someone may have a gambling problem.

    If it was electronic transfers, then that would be all the evidence that was needed. Why no-one in the media asks these basic questions is beyond me.

  • +1

    A source said the couple engaged with the media on the advice of a lawyer. - news.com.au update to story.

    • +4

      Maybe they employed Dennis Denuto

      • +1

        He's still trying to get his photocopier working

  • +1

    When a transaction via CBA is done to a first time account exceeding a certain amount (not entirely sure how much it is) they generally hold the funds for 24 hours before releasing those funds to the third party, they follow this up with an email directly to the account holder with the details of the transaction.

    If CBA sent this email, which the couple can verify via the headers of the email - then yes they've been robbed by CBA.. I think that would be sufficient information to have to prove their point.

    I would have to agree, there's something fishy going on that's for sure - even if they were scammed, the funds technically were never in their account…. so how does one get scammed of 90k when they never had those funds in their account in the first place.

    The next issue is, how do they get pre-approval for a plot of land with unverified documents from their bank… sure they can fabricate this and provide modified statements which in itself is a lot of work, but this means that they've basically employed this whole setup to trick the bank/mortgage broker etc… this is jail time and big time fraud at its finest.

    Then we have the issue of which person managed the finances… and why hasn't the other person been verifying/have access to them.

    There's so many questions and I can almost guarantee that this isn't an issue at CBA's end, I think this issue stems from someone being dishonest.

    I've used every bank system in Australia, 90% of them are no where near the level of what CBA provides. CBA's system has been designed very well compared to the others. Their security principles are draining however they're there for good reason. The only issue CBA has is on the rare occasion where I need to head to a branch, there's one person doing deposits/withdrawals. IT system is almost flawless.

    • +5

      These goons are about to learn about FAFO

      • +1

        I just learned what it stands for

  • +4

    Banks are legally required to keep all transaction records up to 7 years, even after an account is closed. I have personally requested and received bank statements for a closed CBA account before. Therefore, this new claim about the account being deleted makes no difference, if the account was deleted the bank should still have records of the deleted account.

    If the account contained their “life savings” then the couple must have enough evidence of money going into it and being there (e.g: transfers from other accounts, salary deposits, interest earned in their tax record etc..).

    AFAIK first time buyers need to provide evidence of at least 5% of genuine savings over 3 months along with a lot of other financial statements to get a loan, if they were already at settlement sage then surely must already have gone through this process and therefore have this evidence at hand, so proving their claims should not be difficult if true.

    I didn’t pay much attention to this story because it sounded bogus from the start (not to mention I first saw it on news.com.au LOL) , I did however read a few articles today out of curiosity, but so far I have not seen any mention of the couple having any evidence to back their claims.

    • +1

      They're scammers hoping that the Bank pays them some hush money to go away.

      Brand and reputation are important in the competitive A/NZ banking market.

      • +1

        Hopefully those guys will get their 75c from the bank at the end + HUGE lawyers bill. To stop other monkeys doing the same in the feature. And it will be very good for bank reputation.

  • +2

    Maybe ACA has the cameras pointing in the wrong direction. CBA could have been calling out scammers? Keep an eye out it will be ABC media watch material soon.

    • Yeah but the mainstream media machine will continue to bash the Banks - an easy scapegoat.

      A common enemy of the people will keep them distracted from the real issues at hand.

    • +2

      There are too many red flags in the story. The likely narrative is that the bloke has gambled it away.

    • +4

      Bet you thought that girl bought primo Colombian headphones as wedding gifts, too

    • +2

      The news has been full of people who have been ripped off during bank transfers, the likelihood of someone who doesn't understand the banking system at all trying to take advantage of it was inevitable. It's very likely, considering all the red flags, that one or both decided to take advantage of it.

      I'd like to believe them, but that the bank has told them they need to provide more information and they instead went to the media is a pretty big red flag. So is that the transaction supposedly "bounced" because of the names on the Bank of Melbourne account - that simply wouldn't happen.

      It's also not just a CBA thing. Bank of Melbourne would have the details of the failed transaction, so would the clearinghouse recording the transactions, there would be evidence everywhere. It took a complete failure of multiple systems for this to happen, if it was fraudulently done by someone at the CBA then the timing was sublime and detailed.

      At best they've been depositing for years in a fake account and using a fake bank app. But more likely one or both are just doubling down on their lie.

  • +8

    There is no way on God's green Earth that this is genuine. There are too many red flags.

    For a transaction to disappear, it would require multiple people across different departments working together covertly. I work in Banking so I know that there are strong internal controls,robust governance frameworks and data stored safely in both cloud and physical centres. Your data is protected like Fort Knox.

    They could've had the money at some stage but I think the bloke has spent it, most likely gambling, drugs or hookers.

    • That's a lot of hookers. But gambling yes.

    • +1

      i mean people here think they saved up all that money working mcdonalds for 4 years lmao.

    • sounds like a fun weekend

  • +2

    This is an interesting thread to follow on the heels of 'What Is My Girlfriend Entitled to IF We Break up?' https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/796936 ;) I suspect someone has some explaining to do and there'll be tears before bedtime!

    • If he has lost it all, is she entitled to half the amount? Will he have to pay her a debt in instalments for the rest of his life?

  • +1

    This is CBA, not FTX.
    It is not in CBA interest to rip off a few pennies.

  • +1

    boooo now they couple is playing the mental health card

    • +2

      Well mental health problems are understandable no matter what has happened.

      If they are both lying, therapy is among many things they need.

      If one is lying then the other is going to need a lot of support when they realise, and the liar needs help with their addiction, or whatever the problem they are hiding is.

      And if they are both genuine and telling the truth, then of course they are upset with the loss of so much and the accusations flying around.

  • +2

    Lol I'm sorry but when I saw this story I cried bullshit. It is one of these scenarios:

    *Dude was pocketing the money and spending it on booze/gambling/drugs/another woman and lying to her
    *They're both lying and hoping some go fund me will give them free money
    *Somehow an elaborate scammer managed to trick them into sending them 96k for years (highly doubtful but hey benefit of the doubt)

    The real evidence is there would be a money trail… How was the money being put into the account? If face to face deposits, where was the initial money withdrawn from and why is there no evidence of that / footage from the banks. The entire story is BS and which ever one of them is lying must not be very smart if they think this is gonna work

    • +2

      The guy is a tradie and was apparently making cash deposits. Which would mean visiting a CBA branch or at least an ATM. He was apparently doing this for years, yet has no receipts and CBA has no record of this. I call BS on their scam claim, even if they had the money in an account (which doesn't look it), that account type can't even process external transfers.

      • +2

        If they havent kept the receipts there should still be security camera footage of him making the numerous cash deposits. The police would be able to get those.

        • +7

          Would be interesting to see if these cashies line up with income reported to the ato.

      • +3

        Cash deposits would have both receipts given to him + they can check the cameras to see if he was actually going in.

        1000000000% he was taking money of his poor wife/gf (whatever she is) and heading down to the pub to smash the pokies/cocaine/strippers.

        I've known people who became gambling addicts and were able to gamble away millions let alone 96k.

        He's dug himself in deep now and is just trying to ride the lie (like these other people I knew… would straight up lie to your face about it).

  • +3

    Old mate spent whatever money they had on the pokies/Sportsbet (my guess)

    Assuming they are dodgy, I imagine CBA would have solid grounds to sue for defamation plus couple would be up for criminal charges if they have doctored statements etc

    • +7

      If the money disappeared in some bank fees, possibly for services they didn't render, yeah we could understandably be outraged at CBA.

      The largest problem here is that the couples story makes no sense. It is simply some vague, but convoluted, allegations with no proof of anything.

      The existence of CBAs letter is written evidence of the facts as they see them. This isn't something the bank is ever going to lie about. (That would be reputation ending stuff…. for 90k??)

      • This isn't something the bank is ever going to lie about. (That would be reputation ending stuff…. for 90k??

        I'm in no way suggesting CBA or even the couple are lying, what I'm saying is that arguments like "This isn't something the bank is ever going to lie about." are bs.

        ANZ was charging dead people fees for advice (obviously) not given.
        Yet they are still a Big 4, despite, in my view a far worse hit to their reputation that the alleged here.

        this isn't something the bank is ever going to lie about.

        Why not? What if it's systemic, or what if it shows they don't have the controls in place that everyone claims they do?

        All you are doing is: Well that wouldn't happen, rich people wouldn't (profanity) over someone for a small amount.
        Yet, all you are seeing is (an alleged) single example.

        You are also conflating the wealth of the entity CBA, when behind the facade are humans.

        A similar bs argument could be made about the couple, well if they are lying it's fraud which is an indictable offence, therefore they wouldn't do it for $90k.

        • +2

          Except I've known people who were gambling addicts who would lie to your face about the money they borrowed / stole off people. One dude I knew for years lied so much that you would get confused trying to remember which lie was the current one.

          You are massively underestimating the lengths of what someone with a gambling addiction will go through to protect themselves.

          If he comes clean he risks losing everything, so he's rolled the dice (probably because he's not the smartest) hoping that if the banks weren't buckle, maybe they can get a gofundme going or something to bail them out.

          • @Ruddaga:

            You are massively underestimating the lengths of what someone with a gambling addiction will go through to protect themselves.

            No, I have never said which party I think is telling the truth, I'm just saying some arguments suck.

        • +1

          Charging account fees for dead people (they still have an account open do they not…) or providing dodgy insurance advice is a little different than taking 90k off someone. The story has absolutely no merit.

          If the couple complained that the bank had doubled up on fees over 5 years and they were down like 5k or something it would be half believable.

    • +2

      It isn't that we trust the CBA, The story has more holes than swiss cheese. If it was true the CBA would have records as would the receiving bank that supposed bounced their 90k transfer, the account would not have been a netsaver and transaction history would easily confirm the amount and no deleting the account doesn't hide its transaction history. So many things are wrong with the story that the chances of it being true are infinitesimally small and would require failures of 2 banks, compromise of their transaction systems and would require many people from different areas within CBA and the transfering bank all to be in on it to con a Measley 90k.

  • +4

    I do feel sorry for her, imagine if he has blown it, she has no idea. The lying and addiction is bad enough, she has gone to lawyers, media and now police involved. It is so ugly, hope she is ok.

  • hmmm it was his account but she was trying to transfer the money to another bank while on holiday to Bali?

    WTF

    • +1

      Yep, their story stinks. When I transferred my house deposit (which was less than 96k), I had to spend an hour in a bank, and it felt like they were handling the nuclear codes (multiple managers to witness and sign). Even ignoring theirs being a Net saver account that doesn't even process external transfers, they think they can just move this amount of money in Bali and there are no flags? It's inconceivable.

      • +4

        Yep, their story stinks. When I transferred my house deposit (which was less than 96k),

        What? I just did a transfer of 200k and all I did was call up my bank.

        • +2

          Same, it is very easy to transfer money these days. A lot of us here on ozbargain are multimillionaires and we never experience any of the weird stuff that these other people claim to have when transferring large sums of money. It's so strange.

          It's like we are living in another world.

      • +2

        Yeah. When I went in to transfer deposit on a house the bank teller even called up the conveyance lawyers to double confirm all the banking details on the forms before doing the transfer. This was with suncorp.

      • BoQ allows you to transfer a lot more then that by just setting the limit in your app.

    • +1

      It is not uncommon for couples to give each other access to their accounts.

  • -3

    Oddly enough what happens if this is true.

    I guess there would be backups in cold storage that can be audited of past bank statements and hopefully have not been tampered with by the bad actor….

    The problem is that the person is now paralysed by anxiety, so unless they get someone to help them through Power of Attorney. I doubt we will ever find out the real truth at the rate we are going at.

    It would not surprise me there are bad actors within the banking industry.


    Furthermore ATO can assist because that account has had filing of interest earned. It's not impossible to trace this. If it matches up to an interest earned on that $90k or so, then there must have been some money in there at some time even though CBA claims it never was there.

    BTW the devs at Commbank are terrible. I was arguing to one about how poor their security practices were on the train a few years ago and they started to punch me. What a terrible day that was… I wrote about it on Whirlpool I believe at the time and also noted the various credit card leaks that were happening at that time which suggested it was something internal. They got too defensive when I called them out. I'm not sure if that conversation ended up being censored. (Unopened cards were being attacked if I recall.)

    Person was obviously wearing that commbank dev shirt at the time which was being given to the devs…

    Also on a side note, wouldn't it be funny if it was because some bit flipped and the account balance changed? I always wondered if this was the stuff of science fiction.

    • Bit Flip! Thats a possibility i hadnt thought of yet.

      Would their redundancy systems be robust enough for a rare Bit Flip?

      • +1

        Checksums have existed for a very long time, random "bit flips" are not an issue for enterprise hardware, let alone home computers (or your PC would be crashing daily)

    • +1

      I guess there would be backups in cold storage that can be audited of past bank statements and hopefully have not been tampered with by the bad actor…

      Correct, cold store backups are immutable by design, infact any decent back up is.

  • +1

    Their news interview reminds me of this

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdUCUFd-YH8

    Funniest part is at @8:53 when he said they didn't spend any money and there's 150k left in the account then changed his mind ROFL

    • Oh wow. I wasn't aware of that story. Glad I found out about it now and not 7 years ago so I could see the outcome!

      https://www.inquirer.com/news/new-jersey/kate-mcclure-johnny…

      • So was he ever actually homeless? Was he actually a veteran?

        • +1

          I think he was both. But he was discharged after 14 months where the contracts are usually required to be 4 years and he was never deployed.. I feel like "veteran" term should be more guarded and I don't think he deserves it. Anyway they concocted the last $20 for gas part up to garner support. Generate more sympathy than just a drug addict homeless person they found near a casino.

      • +1

        This is why I take most sob sob stories with a grain of salt.

        These guys here created a blueprint on how to scam the society, if it wasn't for greed, the 3 would've probably gotten way with it

  • +2

    I am no Sherlock but there is just too many holes in their story.

  • +2

    Calling it now, he's got a drug or gambling addition. Tells the gf it's all going into the CBA account.

    Pulls out the surprised Pikachu face when the cheque bounces.

    I find it very hard to believe that he gets paid solely in cash, and drives to the bank regularly to deposit it.

    • +1

      Yup as I mentioned before, I've known people who lied to everyone in their life about money they took and pissed away on gambling (and I'm talking millions).

      People seem to forget that to some people, lying isn't a big deal.

      • +4

        Yep the really laughable thing is one of the friends claiming no one drops that sort of cash on gambling. The reality is a LOT of people do and often they are dropping many times that amount and it is something they actively hide from their family and friends.

  • +1

    I reckon its a load of BS, they made up the fact that they had $90k to begin with.

  • +1

    Bitflip!

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