Santander to reimburse customer after ATM error left £210 short
Bank initially concluded a depositor had paid in less but reversed the decision and added compensation after a consumer champion intervened
A Santander customer who says an in-branch cash machine swallowed £1,100 has been reimbursed after the bank initially credited only £890 and concluded she had deposited less.
The customer, identified in media coverage only as H.M. of Cheltenham, told This is Money that she fed £1,100 into a Santander deposit machine and the screen soon displayed the message "a hardware error has occurred" before the machine rebooted and failed to print a receipt. Her account did not show the deposit initially; after several calls to Santander it was credited a few days later with £890, leaving a £210 shortfall. She complained to the bank and visited the branch, which was closed when the error occurred.
According to the customer, branch staff told her that when the cash machine was emptied on the day of the incident it contained only £50 more than expected. The customer said she was told to expect a follow-up call that did not materialize. Santander's head office later told her it could not find the missing funds and concluded she must have paid in only £890, effectively closing the complaint.
Helen Crane, consumer champion for This is Money, took up the case and contacted Santander on the customer's behalf. After that intervention, the bank reversed its position and agreed to credit the outstanding £210. A Santander spokesman said: "We have informed the customer that we’ll be giving her an additional £210 as a goodwill gesture as a consequence of the inconvenience caused by this matter."
When the customer said she had lost interest on the money and spent time resolving the issue, Santander agreed to add a further £75 in compensation.
Crane noted in her column that depositing cash at a self-service machine can feel risky and that some customers prefer counter transactions with staff, but that increasing branch closures and reduced opening hours mean machines are often the only option. Crane also pointed out that machine and till reconciliations can produce discrepancies and that other transaction errors on the same day could explain mismatches, while warning that staff or third parties could sometimes overpay withdrawals and fail to report it — a scenario Crane described as a possibility rather than a finding in this case.
Santander did not expand on the technical cause of the hardware error or the reconciliation that led to the initial £890 posting. The bank's decision to reverse the complaint followed the intervention by a consumer advocate and the customer's continued escalation.
The customer said she had banked with Santander for 20 years and was upset at being effectively accused of dishonesty. After receiving the outstanding £210 and the £75 goodwill payment she said she planned to avoid using self-service deposit machines for the foreseeable future.
The case highlights growing reliance on automated deposit services as branch networks shrink and underlines the challenges banks face in reconciling machine errors, customer complaints and the need for timely communication when hardware or software faults occur. Consumer advocates say banks should ensure prompt, transparent investigations and appropriate interim protections for customers whose deposits are affected by machine failures.