Customers of Republic Bank (Guyana) are reeling as millions of dollars are missing from their accounts. Over the past week, several customers have complained that monies are missing from their accounts and some even took to social media to call the Bank out for the discrepancy.
On Wednesday, the Bank finally publicly confirmed that the monies were indeed missing after previously denying knowledge of the reports. Earlier in the week, after several customers reached out to Guyana Times about their missing money, a call to the Bank by this publication was met with denial by one of the managers.
One customer related to this newspaper that on Saturday last he visited the Republic Bank Automatic Teller Machine (ATM) at Vreed-en-Hoop, West Coast Demerara to do a transaction, but he received a notice saying there were insufficient funds to honour the requested amount. He said this prompted him to conduct a balance inquiry and to his astonishment his account only had $9000. The customer said that he was left speechless, since he was aware that his account had over $140,000. He said that on Monday, he went to the Bank and made a report and was given a dispute form to fill out. He said that he was advised by the teller that the investigation process for such a claim takes between 60 to 90 days. He said that he was also informed that the matter has to be investigated by the Bank’s Trinidad branch.
The customer expressed dissatisfaction with the response by the Bank, adding that when he enquired about reimbursement, he was not given positive feedback.
Meanwhile, another customer said that he too was left shocked when he realised that $2 million was missing from his account. He said an inquiry revealed that money was deducted from his account to pay for several online purchases.
Another customer said that she went to the ATM and found that $60,000 was missing and went right away to the Bank. She said she too was given a dispute form to fill out. The young lady slammed the Bank for not being honest with its customers about the hacking incident.
Additional security measures
On Wednesday, Republic Bank (Guyana) confirmed that some of its customers have been impacted by recent fraudulent activity on its Visa International Debit cards.
The Bank said that additional security measures have been put in place to reduce further impact, and as a result, some customers may experience interruptions in service.
In a statement, the Bank said it was taking the necessary steps to regularise all affected accounts using a well-defined, standard process, focused on reducing customer inconvenience. “The Bank regrets the inconvenience to its customers and advises that impacted customers will be asked to confirm and validate their transactions to assist with this process,” it stated.
According to the Bank, it was able to quickly identify cases where customers’ cards were compromised and was able to effectively minimise the risk to other customers.
The statement highlighted that the Bank would continue to ensure that the most up-to-date security was available through all of its channels for the financial safety of the Banking public.
“The Bank also takes this opportunity to remind customers of the need to be vigilant when using their debit cards and monitoring their account activity.”
As of recent, several customers have complained of unauthorised deductions and transactions being made utilising their Bank accounts.
A section of an account statement from the bank to one of the customers
