Duplicate payment made to US consulate during electronic transfer

#1
Hi,

My husband (RAJAGOPAL MANOHARAN,Passport No- J7496647) applied B2/B1 US VISA. For the same Rs 9120 transferred to Unique Beneficiary account Number- TIER1730117576243 , IFSC Code-BOFA0MM6205 , Beneficiary Name- BANA MUMBAI US VISA SFA through Electronic funds transfer(EFT) from my account( ICICI BANK A/C No 002101521166). But due to system error, Two times Rs 9120 has been transferred to Unique Beneficiary account Number- TIER1730117576243,IFSC Code-BOFA0MM6205. Transaction is made on 11th December.

I wanted the duplicate payment to be reverted. In the past 65 days, I wrote my compliment to Visa support helpdesk, "Visa fee cant be refunded" they answered without analyzing the issue.

Next I talked to ICICI customer care, they told me to contact the beneficiary account bankers.

Then I contacted Mr.Anant in Bank of America Mumbai branch, he directed me some one in their Chennai branch.

BOA, Chennai branch asked for authorization letter from ICICI bank(whereas ICICI have confirmed by payment made to the above mention account twice through email), with great difficulty I got the authorization letter from ICICI bank and send to BOA fellows, now they came and asked me contact the support desk again.

With the certificate issued by ICICI bank I contacted Visa support helpdesk. They replied again telling "We understand that you are looking forward to revert the duplicate payment. We cant refund visa fee"

Under this situation whom should escalate this issue

Thanks,
Lavanya
 

expert

Administrator
Staff member
#2
RE: Duplicate payment made using NEFT transfer

Frankly is it due to your refreshing twice the payment page or due to bug in ICICI payment software which is unlikely?

Waiting for your reply.
 
#3
RE: Duplicate payment made using NEFT transfer

Every transaction results in giving out the transaction id but when I was making the payment after the final step, there was timeout(which may be because of the load at server side or my internet speed may be slow that time). Without verifying whether the previous transaction is successful, I made the payment again following the entire procedure. Afterwards when I looked at the mini statement, I could understand the transaction made twice.

BOA now says write to the consulate general for this. I am not sure how to contact the consulate general. This is extremely unfair, they asked me to get the authorization letter from ICICI, I did so, now they asking me to write to the consulate. BOA can forward this to their customer which they are not doing.

Expert said:
Frankly is it due to your refreshing twice the payment page or due to bug in ICICI payment software which is unlikely?

Waiting for your reply.
 

expert

Administrator
Staff member
#4
RE: Duplicate payment made using NEFT transfer

I see. BOA is no way involved in this. You'll need to contact the Consulate about duplicate payment made. Such issues occur daily across the world, in India and in USA equally. They've got to refund the amount at any cost. The duplicate payment isn't Visa fee. Visa fee is the first payment you've made.

You can even challenge them even in court too. You should contact their payments/account dept. Otherwise you can Google duplicate payment made issue in US consulate and many more like you will be in the same boat in other countries too. Contact and work it.
 
#5
same thing happened to me on 12th June 2013. I was paying visa fee of Rs.18240 for my parents visa, but it showed me error as 'System maintenance'. When I checked transactions my money was deducted 3 times instead of once. I contacted ICICI immediately but they asked me to send email to nri@icici.com since I am ICICI NRI customer. after lots of email follow ups the sent me link to contact uscis visa helpdesk. I even contacted visa help desk but got reply saying transaction cannot be reverted.
Now ICICI has sent me letter for 'Recall of NEFT Transactio' and it needs to be on ICICI letter head. But how can I get letter on ICICI letter head when I am not in India. Plus ICICI is not admitting that its error in ICICI NEFT system which is causing errors.

Now, I am planning to file a complaint in consumer court.
 

expert

Administrator
Staff member
#6
The right person of ICICI to handle this would be sitting in Mumbai, Chennai or Delhi in remote office .. So does not help much even if you're in India. About consumer forum, you can't drag US consulate in consumer court. But in normal court only. I don't think it can be called a mistake from ICICI bank. They received requests 3 times in whatever way and their computers processed in the right way. You can claim money from ICICI Bank if you submitted transfer request once but got debited thrice.

I suggest you first talk to Banking Ombudsman. But I think he can do little. Why don't you contact Office of foreign affairs in the US? Lavanya(the OP) wouldn't have done anything (who wants to Irk Visa officer for little amount?).
 
#7
Thanks for reply.

I am planning to lodge a complaint against ICICI bank in consumer court. Clearly its an issue in ICICI software which pulled extra amount from my account. I am sure ICICI knows about this issue but still they are not interested in returning my money.

Currently I am in USA. Could you please guide me for lodging complaint in consumer court as I am unaware of procedure.

Thanks.
 

expert

Administrator
Staff member
#8
Here is how to file complaint in consumer court. To file in consumer court you need not come there physically. You can file complaint even by courier.

Secondly I want to clarify the meaning of non-refundable for US Embassy and others.

Most of places any fees is not refundable. School admission fees, regular fees, doctors fees, hospital fees etc are all non-refundable. Similarly US Embassy fees is non refundable. But it is clearly very different in duplicate payment occurring online which is unavoidable most of times since this the way computers and software work. In other words, that extra duplicate payments were never to be paid nor ever become a fee for US Embassy or any other organization and it went through due to software handling issues.

You need to ask US Embassy about duplicate payment issue and not about refund of your fees. There is a difference.

Secondly don't pull ICICI Bank in court .... before using it's services you've agreed to all of their terms and conditions. Haven't you? Unless you read it thoroughly ...
 
#10
Have you get refund??. I am also facing the same issue paid twice due to system errror :(

Thanks,
Libu

Lavanya said:
Hi,

My husband (RAJAGOPAL MANOHARAN,Passport No- J7496647) applied B2/B1 US VISA. For the same Rs 9120 transferred to Unique Beneficiary account Number- TIER1730117576243 , IFSC Code-BOFA0MM6205 , Beneficiary Name- BANA MUMBAI US VISA SFA through Electronic funds transfer(EFT) from my account( ICICI BANK A/C No 002101521166). But due to system error, Two times Rs 9120 has been transferred to Unique Beneficiary account Number- TIER1730117576243,IFSC Code-BOFA0MM6205. Transaction is made on 11th December.

I wanted the duplicate payment to be reverted. In the past 65 days, I wrote my compliment to Visa support helpdesk, "Visa fee cant be refunded" they answered without analyzing the issue.

Next I talked to ICICI customer care, they told me to contact the beneficiary account bankers.

Then I contacted Mr.Anant in Bank of America Mumbai branch, he directed me some one in their Chennai branch.

BOA, Chennai branch asked for authorization letter from ICICI bank(whereas ICICI have confirmed by payment made to the above mention account twice through email), with great difficulty I got the authorization letter from ICICI bank and send to BOA fellows, now they came and asked me contact the support desk again.

With the certificate issued by ICICI bank I contacted Visa support helpdesk. They replied again telling "We understand that you are looking forward to revert the duplicate payment. We cant refund visa fee"

Under this situation whom should escalate this issue

Thanks,
Lavanya
 
#11
Hello All,
i am facing the same issue of duplicate payment but it was through NEFT via HDFC. I have made 10-15 attempts to USVISA call centre but they just dodge saying it is being investigated by some team in US CONSULATE. This issue has been going on for over 7months now. i have contacted my bank & BOA but they all point to an authorisation letter from US CONSULATE to issue a refund for duplicate payment. have any of you have the refund ??
i would like to know whether i could put a case in consumer court ??
 

Online statistics

Members online
0
Guests online
70
Total visitors
70