Not upheld: payment processing error and fund handling complaint against HiFX Europe Limited trading as Xe

Decision detail

Summary

Mr H complained that Xe failed to complete an international payment of $21,000 and subsequently lost approximately £1,000 when the funds were returned and converted back to sterling. The first payment was held by the recipient's bank due to an incorrect IBAN, and a second attempt with a lower amount was returned due to an incorrect beneficiary name. Mr H claimed Xe was responsible because he successfully made payments to the same beneficiary using another provider. The ombudsman found that Xe is a user-initiated platform where Mr H entered the beneficiary details, and Xe processed both payments exactly as instructed. The IBAN Mr H entered did not match the IBAN used by other providers, indicating Mr H provided incorrect details. Xe's transaction confirmation included the IBAN for verification, and when questioned, Mr H confirmed the details were correct. The ombudsman concluded that the payment failures were caused by Mr H's incorrect beneficiary information, not by any error by Xe, and did not uphold the complaint.

The Ombudsman's reasoning

The ombudsman determined that Xe is a user-initiated platform where Mr H was responsible for ensuring beneficiary details were correct. Xe processed both payments exactly as instructed by Mr H, with the IBAN entered by Mr H matching what was sent and confirmed in the transaction confirmation. Although Mr H did not see the IBAN re-displayed on the confirmation screen, he could have navigated back to verify it, and when initially questioned by Xe about the details, he confirmed they were correct. The payment failures were caused by incorrect beneficiary information (wrong IBAN on the first payment, wrong beneficiary name on the second) provided by Mr H, not by any error or unreasonable action by Xe. The inconvenience experienced was due to circumstances beyond Xe's control.

How this compares

Source

Read the original decision on the Financial Ombudsman Service website