When paying a bill or someone in Online Banking, it is your responsibility to ensure that you’ve typed the correct sort code and account number of the person you are paying. This information should be checked on Step 3 of Pay a Bill or Someone and amended if you’ve typed it incorrectly. This information is repeated on Step 4 – the final page of the process. You can print the confirmation screen for your records.

If you’ve still typed in the wrong information and confirmed the payment, there is little we can do to get the money back for you – partly because of Data Protection Act regulations surrounding the account of the person you accidentally paid. We can write to  the bank where you have sent the payment giving the account details of where you accidentally sent the payment and ask them to investigate whether your payment can be returned to you. In order to do this, we will need the sort code of the bank concerned. However, we can  also put a trace on the payment to find the sort code if you’ve not kept a copy of the payment but this does take some time. A fee is payable for this service. In the meantime, you should arrange for payment to be made to the correct recipient

The Online Banking Helpdesk may be able to help if you cannot identify the bank from the sort code. They can also put a trace on the payment to find the sort code if you’ve not kept a copy of the payment but this does take some time.