Account mandates,

Juniper and her brother were signatories on their elderly mother's account. The account mandate said they had to act jointly to authorise any transactions. However, in May 2023, Juniper noticed a payment of $10,000 to her mother’s lawyer that Juniper had not authorised. She contacted the bank and learned her brother had authorised the payment at a branch. She complained the bank had breached the mandate and asked for the payment to be reversed. The bank acknowledged its error but declined to reverse the payment, saying the payment was for legal fees invoiced to her mother and that it did not believe her mother had been financially disadvantaged by the transaction. It agreed that the error had caused Juniper stress and inconvenience and offered her $750. However, Juniper did not accept the bank's offer. She said the bank needed to reverse the transaction to put right its wrongdoing. She was unhappy about aspects of the legal fees and said the payment had taken away her right to dispute them.

September 2024