A SERIOUS WARNING ABOUT BANGKOK BANK HUA HIN BRANCH

[mortified]

I found out (purely by chance) that a print out of my personal bank account had been given freely by BKK Bank Hua Hin branch to someone unconnected with my account. I had no prior knowledge of this, nor had I been asked is it was OK or given my consent.
This is in direct breach of the banks own customer code and a sackable offence to the staff member concerned.
Implications are very serious. Consider your a local business, would you want your competitors finding out your businesses financial standing for the asking ?
I have terminated my relationship with BKK Bank and the matter is under investigation at Head Office in Bangkok.

[lomuamart]

Good luck and I hope the bank employee finds the exit door.
However, your post does beg the question - was it a mistake, or were your account details requested by a third party?
Either way, it's unforgivable.

[mortified]

Absolutely definitely not a mistake, this was a request made by an adversary and the staff member gave this to the person asking due to their "good standing" with the branch.

[Hobiecat]

Well I bank there also. How did you find out your information was given out? I'll curious if this has happen more than once.

[The understudy]

Hellao there Mortified!!

The question that Hubblecat asked would interest me too how did you founf out that your Account had being looked into by an unrelated person? This is in deed a very serious Offense and I hope the guy who did this will be Fired and booted out Immediately!!!

Your's very concerned The understudy!

[redzonerocker]

we all know how many uk/western banks & insurance companies have moved their business & call centres abroad these days.
i saw a documentary not long back about the system in india ( the most popular destination for banks to move to) & it made pretty scary viewing.
bank employees were prepared to sell account details for as little as £100
i wouldnt like to suggest that all thai or indian bank workers are all corrupt but in such poor counties where poverty is so widespread, the temptation is surely a lot higher.
it is definately cause for concern especially as there is no way to check who has been looking at your account

[crazy88]

Mortified

This behaviour by a bank employee is unacceptable I agree .

Could you please,if possible, tell us the following in order to cast more light on the situation as some people will find this story quite alarming ?If you cannot ,for any reason,answer at this time I will fully understand .Your privacy has been invaded enough .

Did your adversary have any perceived business, or personal, financial dispute with you ?

Do they (as Thai or farang ) have a high standing in the community or your personal life/business which would cause a member of bank staff to be either intimidated by,or highly trusting of them ?

Up until recently my staff ,for many years,could easily have gleaned this information from the bank without any written or verbal confirmation from me ,as could my staff and family partners in the UK up until not too many years ago .I had thought the banks in Hua Hin a little more on the ball until I read your post .

My mother could ,and regularly did,use mine and my fathers cards in a number of business and personal transactions for many years without question from banks,shoe shops ,hairdressers etc... back home .

Back to the point .Did this person attempt to defraud or steal from you, via the bank ,as far as you are aware ?That would be ominous as you seem to have discovered this circumstance by chance and could,possibly,have been fleeced .

I no longer use the services of my former bank in southern Thailand since a small branch(my local one!!!) allowed the withdrawl of funds by a school teacher and local orbitor from an account not held by either of them .The money was earmarked for a charitable donation to the local school and had been sent by a large business to the personal account of one of their representatives .Imagine the embarrassment when he took the bigwigs from Australia to the bank prior to the presentation in order to draw the (already relocated) funds ?

What was next ? Landlord drawing your rent out early ? Wife needing to pay gambling debts ,husband needs to buy mea noi more gold as he has a new one and she has found out,next door need a new car ? People were not happy and many withdrew all funds ,including myself .As far as I am aware there were no more incidents .

I sincerely hope there are no more in Hua Hin and that this is just a rotten apple ,or case of stupidity on the part of inexperienced staff .I also hope it does not adversely affect you .

Best regards

Crazy88

[Guess]

I doubt you will get anywhere legally, but hope that Bank BKK see the potential damage and take action. However if you have not lost anything then they cannot compensate. You will not win litigation on what might have happened.

The international organization that deals with international disputes including signatory citizens banking abroad is the ICSID which is a division of the World Bank (sometimes referred to as the WBO).

The problem is that Thailand are not a signatory. Bank BKK, Krung Thai and Siam Bank are all registered in Singapore, which is a signatory, even though they are officially owned/run by Thai families.

http://tinyurl.com/2cwglm

I would take your complaint out of Thailand to Singapore or the ICSID and you may get same response.

I only keep relatively small amounts of money in Thai Banks (mostly BBK actually) but I am considering moving to Maybank or Singapore's DBS which has strong UK links and a presence in Thailand. These two banks are twenty years ahead of anything in Thailand and will be business and customer asset aware.

In Thailand banking is still very much just a storage facility for cash with numerous ATMs to allow that cash to be retrieved by local, ex-pat and tourist alike.

http://www.dbs.com/th/

[elem]

Dear Mortified,
Would you please elaborate a bit and let us know what really happened and how you got to know about someone else having knowledge about your statements in the first place?
This might help trying to understand what's going on, and perhaps prevent anyone else getting into the same situation
thx!

[mortified]

Taking the Q's in order :

1. Did the adversary have any........

The adversary is in direct competition with my own business in Hua Hin.

2. A deep friendship exists between my adversary and the bank employee (female) involved.

3. No money was taken or attempted to be taken.

I am still waiting (many days later) for even an acknowledgement from Head office in BKK to my complaint.

Its also worth mention that the local Manager was confronted who seemed to think this was all rather funny and his best response was to laugh.

Would YOU bank there after this ?

[VincentD]

I have closed my accounts with said Bank as it is one of the few where you actually have to line up to pay credit card charges at the bank! No 7-11 or other options.

And as far as getting account details, it apparently is not difficult if you have the account name and number.

Read this story and cringe...
http://www.stickmanbangkok.com/Reader20 ... er3985.htm

[splitlid]

tried to transfere about 600,000 baht from SCB to bangkok bank and was told that it would take 7 days as could only transfere 100,000 baht per day to the bank...thought i was drunk..........

[crazy88]

Mortified

Leads me to wonder what your adversarys' motive is .

Maybe just nosing to see how your weekly banking is looking compared to theirs ?

You BB account is highly unlikely to show your total assets, so no indicator to see whether you could survive a price war.A common tactic here .I have seen people go under because of them .

As you describe you competitor as an adversary I assume the relationship between you was not harmonious before this incident ? I may be wrong of course .

One important factor affecting my thoughts is that I do not know the nature of your business .Therefore I do not know how many competitors you have .

In my experience competitive businesses that fall into the trap of focusing on what each other are doing ,instead of pouring the energy into their own affairs, often lose out to the other competitors in their field .Use this to your advantage .

I hope you can resolve your situation to your satisfaction .

I will certainly NOT be opening any accounts at that bank until I hear the result of your complaints .

crazy88

[mortified]

I finally received a visit from "VIP's" at the bank. They asked me what I wanted ! They seemed to think a few sweet words would make it alright and keep my account. Wrong.

I told them I wanted what any customer would want, honesty and integrity and privacy the things they seem to lack. I suggested the culprit should be "removed". They went away to ponder this.