Capitec gives clients personal details to third parties in branch!!

On the 1st July 2023 a payment was made into my account by a third party of which I did not recognise the payment details. I assumed that the money was paid to my account by mistake, and that the bank will contact me to reverse the transaction to which I have no problem as it is the stand up thing to do.

As the payment was made on a Saturday, I assumed that Capitec would contact me on Monday the 3rd July 2023. To my surprise, Monday at 16:41 PM I received a phone call from a lady (Mrs. E Baloyi) explaining to me that a payment was made to my account by mistake and it is my responsibility to pay it back to her account. I don’t know this lady and I have never met her before.

Having worked in the banking industry for over 20 years I know it is against the bank’s conduct to disclose any personal information without your consent to any third party. The bank is to contact the client (me), explain the situation, provide details regarding the transaction and confirm reversal of the funds with acknowledgement.

I explained to Mrs. Baloyi that the correct way to go about the reversal of the funds was to go to a Capitec branch and they will assist with the matter at hand. When I asked her where she got my name and number, she dropped the line. She then called back at 16:44 and I asked her again where she got my personal details and she dropped the line again.

At 16:45 PM I received a phone call from someone telling me that they are from Capitec and explained to me that the client made a mistake with the transfer. She entered the wrong last digit of the bank account to which she wanted to transfer to. I explained that I understand and then asked the person where Mrs. Baloyi got my personal details from? The person then started to explain the mistake that was made and I explained that I understand the situation but, I want to know who gave her my personal information?

The person then went on saying that Capitec head office have been trying to contact me the entire day without any luck. I did not receive any calls from Capitec prior to Mrs Baloyi contacting me. Again I asked where Mrs Baloyi got my personal information from, the line was dropped.

After a couple of minutes I received a call from a third person explaining to me they are from Capitec, they explained the situation once again and I asked the person who gave my personal information to Mrs Baloyi? The person once again started to explain the situation and I explained to him that I am going to report this matter to the ***** department if they don’t tell me who gave permission to provide my personal information to a third party.

I explained that this is against law to give my information to any third party without consent. I dropped the line. The bank is to protect your information as stipulated in the POPI Act for as long as the bank-customer relationship exists and beyond.

Hopefully I will get feedback from the bank today else, I am escalating the matter to the Ombudsman and contacting Devi from The Devi Show investigate the matter.