What can a bank customer expect when instructions go awry and - in the case of reader Mr J - a cash transfer fails to occur and a supplier ends up with a rubber cheque?

Responding to our recent report on Bank of Ireland's "100 Ways to Better Banking" project for the millennium, Mr J wrote to say that his experience with his bank - not Bank of Ireland - had been less than satisfactory.

"I recently needed to write an unusually large cheque on my account and needed to transfer cash from a deposit account on the day of the "rollover". Both accounts are with the same bank and Mr J sent his bank a letter alerting them that he would be making these transactions on the date in question.

"A few days later, I got a call from a customer relations manager, saying that the letter had been received and that it would be acted on as requested. To my surprise the cheque was returned, referring the payee to me. To my further surprise I received a statement later showing that the transfer from the deposit account had been made on the date in July, but that the cheque had been rejected."

The bank promised to investigate how this error happened and immediately issued the funds to Mr J's client, "who could have taken it all very badly but in fact did not". Mr J is still waiting for the bank's explanation as to how the mistake occurred. "I was embarrassed and it cost me some money and time to sort it out. What should I expect from the bank?"

Bank spokesmen have told Family Money that these mistakes sometimes happen - even when an official acknowledges receiving the original instruction, as happened in this case. There doesn't seem to be any official guideline on how staff deal with problems like these. Family Money was told that managers and officials are expected to use good judgment and some initiative in sorting out the problem the bank customer might have with the cheque recipient. This could include compensating the client for any telephone or other expenses incurred in resolving the problem. "It wouldn't be uncommon for the bank manager to write to the customer's customer to explain how the bounced cheque was caused as a result of a bank error," one bank spokesman said. "That usually goes some way to smoothing things over," he said. It shows "the bank is making a genuine effort to make it right".

Where the bank customer loses business over such an error, there may be a case to take to the Ombudsman for the Credit Institutions, who can order that the customer be compensated. However, a bank's internal complaints procedure must be completed before a case will usually be accepted by the Ombudsman.