I’m Nominating the Commonwealth Bank’s Personal Lending division a Shonky!
I am in the process of refinancing with a cheaper interest rate bank (moving from a 16% personal loan down to a 9%).
I contacted Commonwealth bank requesting a pay out letter that clearly had the payout figure for a particular date, with account details and BSB for payment.
They read out a privacy script for me to understand that by emailing it outside of the banks network has it’s risks which I completely understood and accepted.
I then the following day received the letter only for the commonwealth bank to have redacted my account number from the letter and not provide the BSB details for transfer.
It was then another 3 hours on the phone with the Personal Lending Team to advise of my disappointment which the operator could not resolve and blamed “Privacy” for something that I had already waved my rights and understood the risks involved.
I then spoke to a Team Leader who then sent me the same letter only to have added the additional text of the BSB but still managed to redact the account number, once again siting privacy but at the same time sent me a bank statement that had the account number in there.
In my opinion they deserved to be called Shonky, with a “Can attitude” they certainly don’t have the technology, staff resources or listening skills to be able to put the CAN into their business.
Did you make it clear that you were the account holder and not say another person/organisation making an enquiry in relation to the account? I expect that have enquires from employers, credit providers etc which they may have assigned your enquiry as .
I think from the listing of contact they had made it was obvious the Bank knew who they were dealing with and just cited Privacy as the reason they couldn’t provide that information even though it was to the actual client.
Hi @Db0984, apologies, I forgot to welcome you to the community in my earlier post. Welcome to the community.
Don’t you have loan documents which provide the account number and BSB for the account (this could be a loan agreement, statement or online banking account details). The bank may have through the call was suspicious, being from an account holder who did know their own account.
Banks sometimes live in an alternative universe, as do many other institutions. A few years ago I needed an ING Bank ‘official’ to sign a US government form that had the BSB and my account number on it. The purpose was to confirm it was accurtae, not that the bank took any responsibility for anything excepting that the BSB and account number were accurate on the form. They refused because their policy is to decline signing any paperwork not their own, not on their letterhead.
In lieu they provided a letter on their letterhead as a ‘secure’ password protected pdf with the same information including a nice official looking stamp. I put ‘see attached letter’ on my form and the US government agency was happy with that.
@Db0984’s experience is almost unbelievable but reality sometimes is what it is. He should not be inconvenienced by having to discover a workaround because of a bank refusing to give him his own information on a document to finalise a loan.
I suggest a formal complaint to Combank is worth filing, including asking which privacy clauses they claim they are working under to redact your own information on the document. It might be borderline comedic or at least entertaining from top to bottom.
password protected 