i was sent a check by mistake

[PepperElf]

http://www.my3cents.com/showReview.cgi?id=72323

started one here cos the situation is getting heated over at m3c

apparently the OP threatened suicide. i didnt see the post, so i'm not sure if it's over the financial issues or over the fact that no one agreed with her...

either way... oy that's getting a bit drastic




update - admin at m3c contacted authorities.
(it's over on the feedback side)

[Fryk]

Went to read it, but the review is being... processed. (Ominous music)

[PepperElf]

yeah, on the feedback side they asked admin to contact authorities - which they did.


admin pulled it for the time being because if it's a real threat they wanted to give the OP some privacy


there was some discussion on updating us over the OP's status but it was suggested that it would be too much personal information.

[Rageaholic]

I got through it before it got pulled. The jist of it is that five years ago, Avon sent her a check for $24,000 by mistake. Since her deceased grandmother was involved with Avon, she assumed it was for her (she took her parents place as the executor since they lost their home in Katrina). She verified it with the bank, cashed it, and all was good until December of 09 when the vendor Avon meant to send the check to started threatening legal action with her. Now she is in debt, had to sell a lot of her belongs and will lose her home. Avon sent her a 500 dollar check for her trouble.

She posts the letter, explaining the situation as I have, but most of the commentors said that she should have verified the check with Avon. Some went as far to say she was to blame. She responds back threatening suicide, saying "Forgive me Jesus". Some of the commentors continued to berate her, claiming that she was doing it for attention, but others rushed to her defense. Things got heated and now it looks like it got pulled.

My opinion, Avon screwed up, plain and simple. They should have either let her keep the money and pay back what they owed to the vendor or given her more than 500 dollars. Yes, she should have verified the check with Avon, but that doesn't change the fact that it was Avon's screw up and not hers. People are basically blaming her for Avon's mistake, even if it did work in her favor.

I noticed a trend with some of the commentors on those sites to find fault with the OP even when it was the company who screwed up. Some of these people are more than willing to accept that companies make mistakes, but when it comes to individual consumers, it's all their fault! That's not saying that the customer is always right, because I would have never signed up on CS if that was true, but the customer isn't always wrong either. For companies to threaten her over their mistake is just sucky.

As for the suicide threat, who are they to say she is making it up? Even if she wouldn't have gone through with it, it was clear she was in distress and needed support, not judgment. If they thought she was making it up, they should keep it to themselves or contact an admin. There is no need to be a judgmental jerk to someone who could be in mental distress.

[Fryk]

I think that Avon made the mistake, so AVON should pay the vendor. Cut another $24,000 check to him/her and leave her alone. I don't see it as being unreasonable for her to have assumed it was for her grandmother.

[Nyoibo]

If you find $20,000 on the ground , put it into your account and spend it, if there's an accidental transfer of $20,000 into your account and you spend it, guess what, it's theft, god forbid the onus is on you do find out if that money was meant for you or not.

[Anthony K. S.]

Here's how I see it :

If this woman had been paying a bill and mistakenly sent her payment to the wrong company, she would certainly expect that company to return the money.

The fact that it was her mistake, not the company's, would be irrelevant, in her mind. The money wasn't supposed to go to them, so they should return it.


So, what exactly are we saying here?

It's wrong for a company to take advantage of a consumer's mistake, but it's perfectly okay for a consumer to take advantage of a company's mistake?

She was never supposed to receive the money in the first place, but now that she has, she is entitled to keep it?

No. It's not your money. You don't get to keep it.


I will say this . . . This company seems to be a bit slow on the uptake, seeing as how it took them five years to track down a $24,000 discrepancy.

In my opinion, it's a little late in the day for them to be demanding that she give the money back.

Had they caught the mistake promptly and notified her soon after she had been sent the money, I would have had no issue with them expecting her to give it back. Five years, however, is a little iffy, in my view.

Still, when all is said and done . . . It wasn't her money. As far as I'm concerned, that's all there is to it.

[Boozy]

This lady doesn't seem too....savvy. I suspect that this big crazy world is a problem for her in more ways than this.

If Avon had sent any one of us a $24,000 cheque by mistake, I'm willing to bet that none of us would have found ourselves in this woman's position. We would have called Avon directly to find out what that cheque was for.

When they said "commission" -- and we do not and never have sold Avon products -- we'd know that something was up.

Avon screwed up. But we all have the duty, under the law, to exercise a little due diligence to mitigate our damages. This lady did nothing except verify that Avon was a real company and had drawn a cheque on a real account. She was naive enough to believe that was sufficient, when we all know it is was not.

[MaggieTheCat]

Did it actually say that it's been five years since she got the check? I don't remember reading that part, although of course I might have missed it. I remember her mentioning that her grandmother died in 2004 but not that she got the check 5 years ago.

I do agree that Avon dropped the ball pretty bad here. $24,000 is a lot of money, and it's even worse if they really did wait 5 years to find the error. But I also think that she dropped the ball as well, in not verifying if the funds were her's. She had absolutely no dealings with Avon herself, so why should she expect to get any amount of money, especially a sum that large, without some kind of explanation?

[Fryk]

Here's how I see it :

If this woman had been paying a bill and mistakenly sent her payment to the wrong company, she would certainly expect that company to return the money.

Actually, I believe it should go both ways on that. If she had sent $24,000 to AVON instead, I would be arguing the same thing on Avon's behalf.
Yes, I do think she dropped the ball in not calling Avon. I would have tried to verify it myself. But that is an argument for basic human decency. It's still the responsibility of the check writer to make sure that they are in fact sending the money to where they meant to send it.