On 23 June I went into my local SunTrust Bank to ask for a wire transfer to be sent to South Africa for the purchase of some goods. I am always treated well at this branch and explained to the banker what I required. I needed Rands 536 to be transferred to the Standard Bank in South Africa. (Address, details and banking codes were all supplied.) The banker called someone in another branch, and I presumed it would have been head office in Atlanta who gave her the rate for the day of the transfer. I was not advised of a $50 fee for this work, but discovered a week later that this amount had been charged and taken without permission from my account. I was advised that the wire transfer would take between 48 and 72 hours. I duly e-mailed the people who would be receiving my funds that this would happen. My Rands 536 actually totaled $67.05.
On July 9th I still hadn't heard from the overseas company about whether or not they had received my money, so I telephoned my local branch in the USA to ask when the transfer took place. I was told they would have to phone me back the next day with details, which they did not.
I then e-mailed customer service at Standard Bank in South Africa, who replied that they had received only Rands 436! I asked them where the other Rands 100 had gone, and they sent me the exact details, as follows:
SunTrust had sent the Rands to an intermediary bank, and that bank had deducted the R100 for processing the wire transfer. Standard Bank wrote and told me that they themselves do not take any fee for receiving the money. I have all this information in my e-mails.
I called my bank and was told that they didn't know of any other fees which would be deducted, and from the tone of our conversation they didn't care much what had happened, and they still hadn't given me the info I requested. It took Standard Bank in South Africa a few hours to answer my e-mail, and SunTrust never did give an explanation of themselves.
Since then I looked up online information from the banking community - XE Trade.com - which reads: "Fees Routing to South Africa - Wires in South African Rand (ZAR) to South Africa must be sent through an intermediary bank. This third party intermediary charges their own fees outside of our control. This fee varies, but in our experience, it is usually about 100 ZAR (approx. US$17). We therefore advise that when booking trades into ZAR you buy an extra 100 ZAR to cover for the intermediary fee."
My question is this: if banks are to be accountable for not ripping off their clients, then why, at the time of purchase of my funds, was I not informed of the above information? I also was not informed that my $50 would be deducted from my account and that none of it would pay for the transfer through the intermediary bank.
It is time this bank was made accountable for the mistakes it makes. It has been my experience that most of their staff don't know what they are doing, give wrong information and are less than helpful in seeking the correct information for their customers.
I came back to SunTrust after having moved all my funds away to another bank years ago, but now I have to reconsider moving them again with such bad service and product.
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