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Prudential Singapore and its payment bank, Standard Chartered Bank, have announced that the erroneous deductions that caused uproar among its clients were due to “introduction of a file format change.”
This was revealed as part of an investigation into the May 24 incident, which affected over 20,000 policyholders, Today reported. The errors caused amounts of up to 100 times the premium owed to be subtracted from clients’ accounts.
“This was an isolated incident arising from an introduction of a file format change that was used for the collection of funds on May 24,” said Prudential Singapore CEO Wilf Blackburn. “It was rectified immediately with refunds to all affected accounts being made within 24 hours.”
A representative of Standard Chartered also said that the bank had worked with the clients’ banks to “reverse all affected transactions within 24 hours.”
Both firms have already forwarded their incident reports to the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), which will look into the findings and take necessary actions.
Prudential has given assurances to its customers that such an error will not happen again, and extended a monetary token to those affected.
“Since the incident, several rounds of deduction have taken place successfully and additional measures have been put in place to ensure collections proceed smoothly going forward,” Blackburn said. “In addition, these customers have already received our SG$100 token of appreciation for their patience and support.”
