A frugal life is an easy life!

Just before Christmas, we drew £50 from a speedbank. Whilst checking our statement a week later we noticed that Santander had taken the money from our balance twice. A mistake Santander blamed the owner of the speedbank for.
Despite being able to see the duplicated withdrawal on the account, it took the best part of a week and three longwinded and unhelpful phone calls to get the money back.
I would have thought it good practice to safeguard a Santander customer's account by putting safeguards in place to avoid duplicate withdrawals?
Santander staff did not see the logic in this.

At no stage, did Santander accept any blame, as it was "not our cash machine that made the error."

In light of this we put it down to a genuine error/mistake, somewhere between Santander and Tesco, who's cash machine it was.
There was no apology or explanation as to what happened.

On Saturday, when using Santander's "make payments" set up on the Santander website, we had the following experience;

After five payments were made without a problem, a sixth payment was selected. An amount was put into the box and we clicked to confirm.
There was a few minutes delay, as the website attempted to confirm the payment had been made, so I clicked to cancel the transaction.
A box popped up immediately, asking for confirmation of the cancellation, I clicked on yes and the website went back to the main "payments" screen.

I clicked to make a payment on the transaction I had just cancelled, went straight through and made the payment without any delays. After a couple more payments, I went to the main account screen to make sure I hadn't missed a payment out, only to find that the delayed payment, I had clicked to confirm NOT TO PAY, had in fact been paid regardless of my instruction!
Now we have the same monthly bill being paid twice.
A phone call to Santander's telephone banking team went as follows...

* Had to confirm four forms of ID - including the security number on the back of the bank card, that itself would allow a customer service advisor to commit fraud if they so wished - NOT very "secure" are you Santander!

- Using your bill payment system via the website, there was a delayed response, so I clicked to cancel the payment, the confirm box popped up and was clicked. I've gone back into the account and found that your internet banking system ignored my request to cancel before paying and ignored my request to confirm this. Can you put the money back into the account please as it is needed?
* Yes, I can see from your account that it has indeed been paid twice. I will just speak to someone in the internet banking department to see if there are any current issues...
- With respect, I'm not interested in your "systems" and "internet issues" I just want the money paid back as it is needed!
* I won't be a moment.
[Tap your fingers for five minutes on hold with music]
* Hello, I have spoken to the internet banking department and they have informed me that they have no known issues at this time.
- Can we have the money back as it is needed?
* I'm afraid I can't help you with that, but I have a member of our internet banking team on the phone whom you can speak to...
- Can they credit the money back, that your "banking" system took in error?
* No.
- So what's the point of putting me through to another department then? Are you just passing the buck?
* I'm not passing the buck sir...
- Yes you are, all I want is the money back that Santander's error caused to be taken from the account, how do you think that will be sorted out by passing me onto another department that cannot pay the money back?
* They will be able to tell you any problems that the system might be having...
- I am not interested in your systems, I just want the money paid back into the account because it is needed!
* I will let the advsisor from the internet banking department go then as they won't be able to help with that.

[Which begs the question: Why bother getting in touch with them and keeping me on hold whilst you explain the first place?]

- So can you give me the money back your bank's error paid out?
* No! As I told you right at the beginning, I cannot do that!
- So get me a manager that can please?
* We can't give you the money back, you'll have to and ask the company it's been paid to as the payment has gone...
- So now I have to wait until monday to contact the company that Santander have paid twice, then and only then, if they agree to refund, it will take three working days before it appears back in the account, which if I'm lucky will be next friday, almost a week after Santander made the original error?
* There's nothing we can do!

So there you have it folks, if Santander make a mistake by paying a company twice because their website IGNORES your choice to cancel then IGNORES your confirmation of that request to cancel, you are stuffed.
It is not their fault - even though it is - they will refer you to a department that has no influence or power to reverse their own mistake - the department you speak to in the first instance will not have any power to refund their own error, you will have to phone the company (more expense to you) and ask for a refund yourself.

It is irrelevant that Santander made the mistake, their advisors can view it immediately on their screens that it has been paid twice and totally not the fault of the Santander "system" as it has "No known issues at this time"
Funny how Santander's systems always seem to benefit them and not the customer, when a mistake has been made. I wonder why that is???