‘It happens sometimes’: Australian bank tells man who finds S$122m in account

KUALA LUMPUR — Mr Matthew Pearce, a blue-collar worker in Melbourne, woke up last November to a notification that his personal bank account’s balance grew to A$123 million (S$122 million) overnight.

When he notified the Commonwealth Bank about the mistake, Mr Pearce said a customer service representative just laughed at his story and said, “Oh, that’s great.”

According to Mr Pearce, the bank did not act on his case for two full weeks, and afterwards another bank representative called him to tell him a “glitch in the system and it can happen sometimes”.

“(The banking app) actually gave me the option to transfer the money ... so I could actively transfer money into someone else’s account,” he told Australia’s Channel Nine, as reported by the Sydney Morning Herald this week.

“I was pretty shocked about it. I thought they’d actually paid me the money thinking I was someone else.”

Mr Pearce approached the media with his story following the case of Malaysian student Christine Jiaxin Lee, who withdrew A$4.6 million after she was mistakenly granted unlimited credit by Australian bank Westpac.

Lee, 21, was charged in Waverley Local Court this month with dishonestly obtaining financial advantage through deception and knowingly dealing with criminal proceeds.

Mr Pearce’s bank balance has since been restored, and the Commonwealth Bank told Channel Nine that the glitch is now under investigation. MALAY MAIL ONLINE