Company paid invoice twice

RiseToMe

So I have a LTD company and was chasing a payment in May for a (slightly) overdue invoice- got sorted and it was paid in full (Circa 5K).

HOWEVER, the following day it arrived into my (sterling) account for 2nd time- ie it was paid twice. Obviously, I emailed my contact there immediately and told them this and they CC'd me on an email to Accounts asking for the process to return the payment minus the charges (circa 10).

Neither of us received any reply, so I followed up a week later and she said she forgot about it and followed it up again. Again, no reply.

So I have been emailing every Friday about this and getting no contact from the Accounts department despite my contact CCing me every week in her follow ups (shes also clearly annoyed). Shes now on leave until the end of July so I presume nothing will be done in the meantime but I have accounts to do and returns to make:rolleyes:

Where do I stand on this? I dont want to keep the money - I want to return it but cannot do so without being given their process and also acknowledgement that it will be returned minus the charges levied on my account for it.

(Background-this is a very large University in the UK and as such I cannot reverse the payment without sending through additional paperwork and being given payment references otherwise it will continue to bounce over and back. Also, our contract with them is finished so I cannot credit it toward future work)

zig

Send them another invoice and hope they dont notice ??

To be honest what Id probably do there is ignore it in terms of doing your returns and hold on to the money until the end of July.

I would then make phonecalls when your contact returns. Emails can make everyone passive and lazy. A sort of sense of not being serious about it.

If after phone calls they are still not helping then I dont know to be honest! Send a final notice stating that because you have accounts to do that you will have to declare this in your accounts as over paid and hold onto the money and pay your appropriate taxes. If theyre not going to let you pay them back what are you supposed to do?

Rest assured eventually someone will come looking for that money so I think phonecalls are your best bet. If it ends up costing you due to paid tax or whatever then I would take that amount from the repayment.

Trojan

zig wrote: »

Rest assured eventually someone will come looking for that money

+1 large institution will definitely be back looking for it. If it was a one-man show it might be different.

I had a similar situation, with an overpayment of €72k due to "a problem with their electronic payment".

(Yes, I did give it some thought )

RiseToMe

Oh I know for sure that they will come back - that said I worked for this University and the current set up is very complex (I am a spin out company) so I know that my company is under a specific framework and budget code so chances it'd pop up are extremely slim but I am in no way comfortable holding on to this in any form.

Have already advised that we wish to close the Sterling account as it is now no longer required and costing us but we cannot do this with their money sitting in there and also that as accounts are due. I pointed out that we may need to transfer into Euro account and also declare for accounts so more money may be lost on processing fees, FX rate and tax that i will have to pay as it will need to be declared- yet still nothing in reply.

While I would dearly love to phone them - they dont have incoming calls - they all hot desk and there is just one email address in and out for queries bar for the senior most person in accounts who has been CC'd in all emails and is also ignoring the issue.

My contact is COO of the School in question so I'm dealing with the most senior but she cant even get a reply out of them- I presume they are sticking their head in the sand as they don't know how to fix it but that really isn't my issue.

Honestly- I dont want the money nor need it (of course we'd all love free money!) but in posting this I'm not looking for a way to keep it, just for where I stand with them refusing to engage - I presume they can at any point a few years from now come back for it? If so, I presume best way to deal with it is to transfer it to my euro account, declare it, pay tax on it and then take the remaining sum and put it in a holding account until the day?

Trojan

Write a couple of letters, CCing the COO and accounts dept. Send them registered. Spell out the contact you've attempted so far, and the actions you're going to take if you don't hear back from them (transfer to Euro account) and the fees that will be deducted to cover your expenses in doing so.

Graham

Would there be any tax where the additional cash is offset by a corresponding liability?

BlinkingLights

Ring them!
Often emails get pushed around and ignored.

RiseToMe

Trojan wrote: »

Write a couple of letters, CCing the COO and accounts dept. Send them registered. Spell out the contact you've attempted so far, and the actions you're going to take if you don't hear back from them (transfer to Euro account) and the fees that will be deducted to cover your expenses in doing so.

Good idea- doing this now

Graham wrote: »

Would there be any tax where the additional cash is offset by a corresponding liability?

Will check this with the accountant- the issue is we dont have paper trail for the corresponding liability - all we have is money in, nothing to state its due back out.

BlinkingLights wrote: »

Ring them!
Often emails get pushed around and ignored.

See post where I have stated they hotdesk and there is no phone number for accounts - only email.

K.Flyer

Can you not find out from your bank which account the money came from and just transfer it straight back directly from your GB a/c minus any transfer fee.
Note it on the remarks / comments section of the transfer and in your bookeeping as an overpayment returned.
Alternatively, if they are a regular customer and you're billing each month accordingly, can you not take it off their next invoice total, ensuring the invoice / statement shows the payment received and reflected in the total amount due.

RiseToMe

K.Flyer wrote: »

Can you not find out from your bank which account the money came from and just transfer it straight back directly from your GB a/c minus any transfer fee.
Note it on the remarks / comments section of the transfer and in your bookeeping as an overpayment returned.
Alternatively, if they are a regular customer and you're billing each month accordingly, can you not take it off their next invoice total, ensuring the invoice / statement shows the payment received and reflected in the total amount due.

See posts above- I cant return it directly as it is one massive University account and payments put in without a valid (ie given by them) payemnt reference are returned.

And also see above- our contract is now complete- we will no longer be invoicing them so no credit set up applies.

K.Flyer

Sorry, skim read the posts, see the dilemma so.

BlinkingLights

If it's a big sum, I would send them a registered letter to their CFO asking them to contact you urgently and explaining that you have attempted to make contact on several occasions, to no avail.

You should have the companies bank details from the transaction you received and send them back the money straight away. You don't need to contact or talk to anyone. Having worked in Scandinavia the last few years, this constantly happens because debt collectors get invoices after 14 days unpaid. Its a given the money is just automatically return if overpaid. Doesn't matter what the account is, the details will be included in your transaction receipt, so don't worry about that part

RiseToMe

[Deleted User] wrote: »

You should have the companies bank details from the transaction you received and send them back the money straight away. You don't need to contact or talk to anyone. Having worked in Scandinavia the last few years, this constantly happens because debt collectors get invoices after 14 days unpaid. Its a given the money is just automatically return if overpaid. Doesn't matter what the account is, the details will be included in your transaction receipt, so don't worry about that part

Read the posts-without a valid university given payment reference all monies transferred are bounced back immediately. Its policy.

BlinkingLights

If it's a university, their accounts department will want the overpayment returned.
Can you not just ring up and ask to speak to someone in their finance office / accounts department and get them to give you return payment details.

It's entirely their fault, so any transaction fees should be paid by them too.

You're doing them a favour!

If you made an overpayment to a utility company for example, you could be months getting it back!

RiseToMe

BlinkingLights wrote: »

If it's a university, their accounts department will want the overpayment returned.
Can you not just ring up and ask to speak to someone in their finance office / accounts department and get them to give you return payment details.

It's entirely their fault, so any transaction fees should be paid by them too.

You're doing them a favour!

If you made an overpayment to a utility company for example, you could be months getting it back!

If you read the post, they hotdesk, there is no direct accounts phone number, they have email and that's it. I have been emailing my contact who is senior management, they have been ccing all management in accounts so I can get get a payment reference to return it but there has been zero reply.

dar100

Stick the money in the euro account and wait!! They've been given ample opportunity to reply .. If they don't get back to you within a year keep it

Delphinium

About 15 years ago I was paid twice monthly by large American computer company for a rented house. Payment continued for months despite bringing it to their attention. Finally returned it by calling to offices and demanding to see someone to accept a cheque and got the distinct impression it was not welcome. It would probably have passed under the radar but my actions meant it had to be dealt with, and someone had to be responsible for the error.
Maybe same is happening to your payment but I presume it will finally come to light. I would sit on it in the meantime and keep the funds ready for return. Let them make the running.

RiseToMe

Yeah I'm not happy to keep it at all. Its not rightfully mine and no good can come of keeping it.

I dont have a cheque book for the account but I'm thinking I might draw a draft of the amount off the account and just send it over registered to them with a letter and let them figure it out. I would happily fly over and hand it in but my wife is due our first baby any day now so that's not happening for at least three months!

My contact has acknowledged that they likely are having difficulties trying to reconcile it from an accounting view (as I said the set up is strange, basically this is all ran via a budget code which is now closed as we Jo longer deal with them).

Either way I don't want the money, I just want them to take it back buts not as straightforward as a reversal or phoning them.

Graham

I'm not sure I'd go with the draft/post plan.

If it gets lost by the recipient organisation, you're in for a pile of hassle trying to prove the registered letter they have no record of actually contained a draft.

BlinkingLights

The draft may just go into the 'someone else's problem' pile and end up going unbanked until it goes stale. Then they'll go chasing you for the repayment when they finally figure out they made an error and you won't have access to the funds without a complicated bank process to get the draft undone.

The organization MUST have a finance office of some sort though. You need to flag this up with someone other than a 'hotdesk'.

Can you not just ring up and ask to speak to someone in their fianance department and insist on speaking to a manager ?

If it's a university just mention that you're shocked at how lax they are dealing with public funds! That should set off a few alarm bells.

RiseToMe

BlinkingLights wrote: »

The draft may just go into the 'someone else's problem' pile and end up going unbanked until it goes stale. Then they'll go chasing you for the repayment when they finally figure out they made an error and you won't have access to the funds without a complicated bank process to get the draft undone.

The organization MUST have a finance office of some sort though. You need to flag this up with someone other than a 'hotdesk'.

Can you not just ring up and ask to speak to someone in their fianance department and insist on speaking to a manager ?

If it's a university just mention that you're shocked at how lax they are dealing with public funds! That should set off a few alarm bells.

Having worked directly for this University for years I can confirm that they don't have a finance office of any sort anymore. Email is the line of communication. This isn't public fund money either, it is from their enterprise section.

I am dealing with the most senior management of the school already, but they are getting no response from finance.

Will not move with the draft option, will just sit and wait for now and if it comes to it move it to euro, pay may tax and keep balance for return whenever they bother looking.

CeilingFly

I can't see how any tax is due for you to pay as its an overpayment and would be treated as an exceptional item in accounts.

Cost of keeping the sterling account open for a couple of months will be far less than the currency transfer cost and potential currency losses.

I'd leave it as the only funds in the sterling account knowing that it is to be returned when the university wakes up

_Brian

Many years ago I had a share trading account in the U.K., a large sum of money was deposited into the account., I waited and it was there for two years, I wrote a letter asking for all my money on deposit to be sent on and the account closed.
They sent it all on and I invested it, 9 years later I still have it invested.

BnB

dar100 wrote: »

Stick the money in the euro account and wait!! They've been given ample opportunity to reply .. If they don't get back to you within a year keep it

100% correct. I would certainly stop e-mailing or cc'ing your contact on a weekly basis. You are probably starting to annoy them.

His A/Cs department have screwed up. It probably doesn't bother him at all except for the fact that you keep onto him about it. You have done all you can to give it to them and you have a paper trail of e-mails to show this. Either leave the sterling account sitting there with the money in it or else, if you are in a rush to close it, transfer the money across.

It is not worth wasting any more of your energy on it. When (if) they get their finger out, they can get onto you. After a year or two if they haven't got onto you, you can decide what to do with it then. If you have a serious issue with keeping it, you can always just give it to charity.