Standard Bank Private Banking / ***** Division put the interests of *****sters and ********s first

The company which I am a shareholder of recently purchased a farm in a remote area. It is a going concern with amongst others, a website. I knew that the web hosting had to be renewed soon, and on the 1st of December 2024 I received an email from Domains.co.za to renew the hosting at a cost of R90 per month. We sit on a farm with with no cell phone coverage and limited internet; I have to drive a few kilometres to receive an OTP for payments. I proceeded to do the payment for R90, got in my vehicle to receive the OTP and when the OTP came from the bank, the amount looked funny and I cancelled the OTP. Some other OTP for other amounts also came through which I ignored. The next thing I see, two amounts were taken from my account (R10588.88 and R8834.17). I immediately knew that something was seriously wrong and phoned Standard Bank’s ***** people. I got through to a man who sounded very disinterested and after he verified me, I proceeded to explain what I needed and told him to stop the transaction, as it was still showing as pending at that point. He then blocked my card and told me they will investigate and that I need to go to the police and open a case. He also told me that I would still be able to use my banking app. I again told him to stop the transaction after which he said that they first need to investigate. I told him he verified me, that the transaction must be stopped, that my money is being ****** and his response was “our house, our rules” Really? I then drove 60km to the nearest police station to lay the charge (copy attached). En route, I phoned my so-called private banker, none of which were available and eventually got through to Avadna, their team leader, who was also very irritated that I bother her with this on a Sunday. And from there everything just went wrong. My card was blocked, I could not get into my banking app, they forgot to order a new card and I eventually got a card in the bank branch a week later. The apathy with which I was treated was appalling. The result of their “investigation” was declined. No one from ***** even bothered to phone me and get my version. I provided proof of the OTP text messages I never opened and all to no avail. Also, in this period, a transaction I did at Checkers Gordon’s Bay was double debited and if I did not query this, I would have lost that money as well. As far as I know, the batch runs must be verified with the actual documentation (slip) before the client’s account is debited. This clearly does not happen. This means that the millions of bank customers are de*****ed daily by the banks and only when it is queried, it gets attention. Back to Standard Bank and the case. I insisted that the head of Private Banking phone me and to this day, he could not be bothered to phone me. This is the apathy with which I was treated. I do not trust my bank anymore and they did not act in my best interest. This is why I am writing to you for assistance. If this does not work, I will go to the media and share my experience with Standard Bank. Either way, I am done with Standard Bank Private Banking. If the service I got from them was this bad, I might as well bank with any of the smaller banks who give bad service anyway.