Restitution – Page 8

The above announcement currently appears on the Ulster Bank home page. It simply says that the bank is experiencing “some technical issues”, as a result of which some “account balances are not up to date” and some “services are unavailable”. When this happened to the Bank of Ireland the Christmas before last, it meant that some of its customers were able to make ATM withdrawals of amounts greater than their available funds or credit. I am not a customer of Ulster Bank. Nor do I know whether their “technical issues” are affecting their ATMs. However, if they are, then – as I said at the time of the Bank of Ireland error and earlier – making excess withdrawals in such circumstances is not a good idea. Those withdrawals will have to be repaid, either by virtue of the terms and conditions of the contract between the bank and the customer, or because of the legal duty to make restitution of mistaken payments received.

Worse, such withdrawals often amount to theft. A story in the Daily Edge stream of the TheJournal.ie today makes the point rather graphically:

Man gets $1.5m in ATM error … and then gambles it away

A DETROIT MAN faces 15 months in jail, and a court order to pay $1.5 million to his bank, after a glitch allowed him to withdraw unlimited cash from his bank account – which he then lost to his gambling habit.

…

Portuguese bank held unjustly enriched in landmark mortgage ruling

3 May, 20124 March, 2013

| No Comments

| Restitution

The [Portalegre] court’s … decision states that there is “unjust enrichment” in this operation because, as the loan was granted with the sole purpose of financing the property, by handing back the property the debt is extinguished.

via algarvedailynews.com

…

Paintings looted by Nazis returned to Poland – RTÉ News

23 September, 201126 April, 2016

| No Comments

| Restitution

A pair of 19th century paintings by Polish Impressionist Julian Falat – looted by the Nazis nearly seven decades ago – have been returned to Polish authorities in a ceremony in New York.

President Bronislaw Komorowski of Poland accepted the paintings – “The Hunt” and “Off to the Hunt” – at Poland’s consulate in Manhattan yesterday.

via rte.ie

…

Art and Artifice: Hungary can be sued for return of Nazi looted art

9 September, 2011

| No Comments

| General, Restitution

Last week, … [a US] Court rejected Hungary’s motion to dismiss a claim brought against it by the heirs of Baron Mor Lipot Herzog, a well-known Jewish Hungarian art collector.

…

The Court found that (1) the defendants did not dispute that “rights in property” (2) the plaintiffs’ claim that the Herzog Collection was taken in violation of international law was substantial and non-frivolous, and therefore, adequately satisfied the second requirement; and (3) the defendants admitted that the museums and the university (both agencies or instrumentalities of Hungary) were in possession of the pieces of collection identified in the complaint which was sufficient to satisfy the ‘owned or operated’ requirement, ad these bodies were are engaged in “either a regular course of commercial conduct or a particular commercial transaction or act” in the US as of the commencement of the action.

via aandalawblog.blogspot.com

More here: New York Times.

The judgment itself is available here (warning: pdf).

Finally, here is a comprehensive website devoted to the claim.

…

CommBank’s ‘heavy-handed’ tactics after ATM glitch: police called in

15 April, 2011

| No Comments

| General, Restitution

CommBank’s ‘heavy-handed’ tactics after ATM glitch: police called in

Asher Moses

April 15, 2011 – 3:45PM

Comments 123

The Commonwealth Bank is referring about 100 of its customers to police for criminal prosecution as a result of the recent ATM glitch that allowed people to overdraw their accounts, the head of the NSW Police fraud squad says.

Meanwhile, in Victoria, police confirmed that the bank referred two customers for investigation, who had been summonsed to appear in Melbourne Magistrates Court on May 13 charged with theft.

The revelations come after the bank was accused in a report on ABC radio’s AM program this morning of using “unfair and heavy-handed tactics” when trying to recover the funds that were overdrawn from accounts last month after the bank deliberately took its ATMs offline following a database maintenance glitch.

The bank, which announced a $3 billion profit for the half year ended December 31, 2010, has written to customers – including welfare recipients – threatening them with legal action if they do not repay the money in full and has also closed accounts without notice.

via smh.com.au

And here’s another story from the SMH about the issue. This is a sequel to the story blogged by Legal Eagle on Skepticlawyer, noted here, similar to an Irish story before Christmas, blogged here.

…

C&AG probes ‘unlawful payments’ at universities – National News, Frontpage – Independent.ie

28 March, 2011

| No Comments

| General, Restitution, Universities

THE state spending watchdog has begun an investigation into the “unlawful” payment of millions of euro in allowances to senior university staff, the Irish Independent has learned.

The Comptroller and Auditor General’s (C&AG) office has agreed to a request from the Higher Education Authority (HEA) to assess exactly how much was spent on unauthorised payments between 1999 and 2009.

It is understood the investigation will be completed by May.

There has been an ongoing dispute between the HEA — the agency responsible for higher education — and the universities over how much was paid to staff at colleges including UCD, Trinity College, UCC, NUI Galway and the University of Limerick.

The HEA has already told a Public Accounts Committee that it will withhold millions in funding from the universities in a bid to get the money back.

The allowances, including incentives and performance-related bonuses, were originally discovered by the C&AG in 2009

via independent.ie

This issue is nowhere near as straightforward as the report suggests. Have a look at here.

…

Overactive Australian AMTs – criminal and restitutionary liability for over-withdrawals

7 March, 201120 August, 2019

| 5 Comments

| Mistaken payments, Restitution, Restitution

I wrote before Christmas about overactive Bank of Ireland ATMs. Exactly the same issue has just arisen in Australia:

Consumer groups are calling on the Commonwealth Bank to explain what went wrong with its ATMs on Tuesday, with a glitch resulting in some customers withdrawing excessive amounts from the machines. Police charged two men in Sydney on Wednesday with fraud for allegedly withdrawing extra money from the faulty machines during the meltdown.

As with the Bank of Ireland ATMs, the CBA machines operated in standby mode, but if you take money to which you are not entitled, it may very well constitute theft – and even if it doesn’t, it will certainly give rise to contractual or restitutionary duties to return the overpayments. I have this news via Legal Eagle on Skepticlawyer, who argues that

… the Commonwealth Bank will definitely have recourse to recover the money from individuals who have taken advantage of the glitch in its computer processes, subject to the defence of good faith change of position. It’s my theory that one of the reasons behind the rise of unjust enrichment law is electronic banking and the mistakes which arise therein. Seriously! I’ve spoken before about the paradigm case, Chase Manhattan Bank N.A.

…

The Court of Appeal on Barder v Calouori [1988] AC 20 and common mistake of fact

16 February, 2011

| No Comments

| General, Mistake, Restitution

Richardson v Richardson [2011] EWCA Civ 79 (08 February 2011)

Lord Justice Munby

The death of the wife

17. There is no need to spend much time on the law. The principles are set out in the passage in the speech of Lord Brandon of Oakbrook in the eponymous case, Barder v Calouori [1988] AC 20, page 43, which is so well-known that it hardly requires quotation.

18. It is well recognised that the unexpected death of one of the spouses can be a Barder event. Barder itself was such a case (wife killed children and committed suicide five weeks after the ancillary relief order). There have been others in which the claim has succeeded: Smith v Smith (Smith and Others Intervening) [1992] Fam 69 (wife committed suicide within six months); Barber v Barber [1993] 1 FLR 476 (wife died of liver disease within three months); Reid v Reid [2003] EWHC 2878 (Fam), [2004] 1 FLR 736 (diabetic wife with high blood pressure died within two months). But it is not enough to show that one of the parties died unexpectedly very shortly after the hearing. What has to be shown, to quote Lord Brandon, is that the death “invalidate[s] the basis, or fundamental assumption, upon which the order was made”.

…

cearta.ie

Category: Restitution

Bank errors are not a licence to gamble

Man gets $1.5m in ATM error … and then gambles it away

Portuguese bank held unjustly enriched in landmark mortgage ruling

Paintings looted by Nazis returned to Poland – RTÉ News

Art and Artifice: Hungary can be sued for return of Nazi looted art

CommBank’s ‘heavy-handed’ tactics after ATM glitch: police called in

CommBank’s ‘heavy-handed’ tactics after ATM glitch: police called in

Asher Moses

C&AG probes ‘unlawful payments’ at universities – National News, Frontpage – Independent.ie

Overactive Australian AMTs – criminal and restitutionary liability for over-withdrawals

The Court of Appeal on Barder v Calouori [1988] AC 20 and common mistake of fact

Richardson v Richardson [2011] EWCA Civ 79 (08 February 2011)

Lord Justice Munby

The death of the wife