Incredible £11million suddenly appeared in our account – but tiny mistake means we can’t spend it
A SCOTTISH couple discovered £11million had appeared in their accounts but because of a tiny mistake they were unable to spend the huge sum.
When self-employed builder Richard Warnock went to check his account with investment company Arbdn he was staggered to find it had increased by a whopping £8.3m on Wednesday morning.
Similarly, his wife Jacqueline, a nursery worker, saw that her account had risen by £2.5m.
The couple have had their accounts for five years and use them for a self-invested private pension and a stock and shares ISA.
Richard, 56, told the Daily Record: “For a couple of hours there, I thought this might be real and we’d hit the jackpot! It was like winning the EuroMillions.
“My heart was racing when I saw the cash. We had already started thinking about how we would spend it.”
“At first I did think it must have been a mistake – but my wife Jacqui said her portfolio was up too.
“We started thinking one of our company investments had gone through the roof overnight as is the nature with the stock market and this could be genuine.”
While Richard was initially doubtful about the hefty increase but believed he has made a windfall profit when the account balance remained the same for a number of hours.
He then contacted his independent financial adviser Acova Wealth Management to see how he could best spend the money but the husband and wife’s multi-millionaire status only lasted a few hours.
IT ERROR
It was discovered an IT error had caused their funds to rocket skyward.
The pair were told a decimal point had been incorrect placed on the stock.
Richard said: “When we found out that there had been a mistake, my heart just sank. I’d really gotten my hopes up.
“We make aggressive investments that come with high risk. Somedays it can go up or down by £10,000. It didn’t seem impossible to get such a big return on our investment. We are gutted.”
Richard added that they still didn’t know exactly what had happened and said that Abrdn hadn’t been in contact.
They were informed about the error by their financial advisor.
The two accounts were later amended and returned to a value around £500,000.
It is believed the pricing error has impacted a number of clients who hold investment portfolios.
A spokesperson for Abrdn said: “There was an error in the intra-day fund price data feed we receive from a third party.
“This related to a small number of funds from one external fund manager.
“The result was that an error appeared on our system for a short period of time on Wednesday 20 March.
“The issue lay with the company who supply share price data to platforms across the market, including abrdn.
“Our BAU processes identified the error which was then raised with the third-party provider who fixed the issue.
“Values are now showing correctly on our systems. There has been no impact on any customer holdings.
“We regret any problems this may have caused for the Financial Advisers who use our platform and their clients.
“Abrdn is an adviser facing platform and therefore it is right and proper that our interactions on issues such as this would be with the adviser not the customer.”