The Lemon Fool

Hi; longtime Fool poster but firsttime Lemon.

I'm new to running a business; been running about a year. One of my new employees gave me the wrong bank details so her pay went into a different account. The bank aren't being terribly helpful and it is doubtful I'll get the money back at this point. She hadn't been working that long, not even a full pay period so it's not a huge amount; about 500 quid. She acknowledges that it is her mistake.

I'm inclined to just pay her again for the goodwill factor in view of the relatively small amount of money involved. What would others do?

If this was a full time permanent employee I would probably also pay her but I would make sure I sent a trial payment of say £10 first to make sure it hits the correct account before sending a larger amount.

Also I'd be interested to see how the mistake had been made...eg. was it one digit out of the sort code or account number? If it was a completely different number then my scam detectors would be working. For someone who knows how to work the system it would be easy to redirect money to an accomplice"s account knowing that it is difficult to retrieve.

John

pearcey wrote:Hi; longtime Fool poster but firsttime Lemon.

I'm new to running a business; been running about a year. One of my new employees gave me the wrong bank details so her pay went into a different account. The bank aren't being terribly helpful and it is doubtful I'll get the money back at this point. She hadn't been working that long, not even a full pay period so it's not a huge amount; about 500 quid. She acknowledges that it is her mistake.

I'm inclined to just pay her again for the goodwill factor in view of the relatively small amount of money involved. What would others do?

When I was involved in payroll we always insisted on seeing something from the bank that gave the account details. Cheque, paying in slip, statement, letter, whatever and we would take a photocopy to go on file. If it was a statement or letter all we were interested in was the bit with the account details, not the contents.

I got this habit from when I worked for a construction company where there were a number of illiterate employees. It is good protection for all concerned.

These days I think that Debit Card would also be suitable.

Slarti