Losing your hard-earned money can be incredibly infuriating. Especially when you realize that it has been siphoned off from your company bank account, which you thought you could trust. However, if you are someone who has experienced this in the past, you are not alone. In 2020, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) received over 2.1 million fraud reports. This meant that more and more people were getting duped for their money. There are many ways this can occur. For example, scammers and phishing attacks are becoming increasingly common. Wherein scammers impersonate and pretend to be the legitimate bank account holder. If the bank doesn’t have suitable security measures, this can lead to significant losses for their clients. On the other hand, fraudsters can access your bank account details and start siphoning off your money. But that doesn’t mean you cannot do anything to prevent this from happening or even safeguard yourself from such frauds.
According to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), you might be entitled to additional safeguards under federal law if money was taken from your account as part of a transaction utilizing a debit card or electronic fund transfer. Electronic cash transfers include withdrawals from ATMs (where your debit card information could be stolen), debit card purchases, online bill payments, and leaves you’ve scheduled directly from your bank account. In other words, most modern bank clients make the majority of daily transactions. Nevertheless, to better understand how to recover one’s money from a company bank account, let’s first understand the term itself.
What is a company bank account, and how does it work?
A company bank account is also a checking or demand or transactional account. It is similar to a deposit account where the user can carry out withdrawals and deposits at any time. However, these accounts are very liquid, and deposits and withdrawals can be carried out through cheques, ATMs and other electronic transaction methods. A company bank account differs from a savings account as there is no limit to the number of deposits or withdrawals one can carry out. However, as the nature of company bank accounts is very liquid, they do not offer much interest.
There are different kinds of company/checking bank accounts. This includes commercial or business accounts, student accounts, and joint accounts. Concerning business accounts, the signing authority lies with the business executive. Additionally, martial partners can hold joint accounts. Lastly, some banks also offer student accounts, especially for college students. These accounts tend to be free until the student graduates.
Most banks want to draw customers in by giving free or inexpensive checking accounts before persuading them to take advantage of more lucrative products like personal loans, mortgages, and certificates of deposit. However, a certain amount of fee is always charged as an overdraft fee if the user reaches a certain account balance.
Recovering money lost from a company bank account
Now that you have a fair understanding of what a company bank account is and how it operates let’s take a look at how to recover your money in case any fraudulent transactions occur in your company bank account.
- Inform your bank: Your bank might not know your losses if you don’t inform them. Therefore, you should immediately reach out to the bank if you see unauthorized activity in your account. The sooner your bank knows, the better, as timely action can be taken. Banks generally take ten business days to investigate the issue. And in the other three days, they are said to inform you. So, depending on the nature of your losses, banks have 45 days to complete their investigation.
- Complete the bank’s affidavit: When the bank or credit union receives a signed document that you did not make the disputed charges, they will credit your account with the money you originally paid. So that you have documentation of the day and time the affidavit was delivered, send the document back using certified mail with a return receipt requested.
- Set up a fraud alert: To ensure you are not at risk of identity theft, set up a fraud alert with either of these reporting agencies- Trans Union, Experian and Equifax.
- Make a new debit card or bank account: Suppose the fraudulent charges were made using your debit card or account and bank routing numbers. In that case, the bank can determine which method was used. You should receive a new debit card and bank account number from the bank. Make careful to configure them with secure PINs or passwords. Avoid using transparent personal information or dates when creating your PINs and passwords.
