Wrong account money transfer

Hello everyone,

I recently encountered an issue where I mistakenly transferred an amount of (~400K yen) to the wrong account within Shinsei Bank. The intended recipient was a friend with the same account number but a different branch code. Unfortunately, the recipient's name didn't display during the transfer, and due to my limited Japanese proficiency, I mistakenly selected Shibu branch instead of Shibuya.

I've been in touch with the bank daily, but they haven't provided any updates after more than 10 days. I'm seeking advice on whether there's a possibility of recovering the funds or if there's a way to file a complaint against the recipient to retrieve my money.

Any shared experiences or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

If you can't communicate yourself, find a friend or collegue with proficient Japanese skills, explain the situation to them and ask them to support you in the communication with the bank.

That has been already done. They are either saying no response or saying contact us next week.

legally, it is your mistake. you need to solve your problem by yourself. you may ask their kind help.

you implies that "recipient's name didn't display" may induce your mistake . but, it is highly unlikely. I am sure that recipient name was displayed. it is your 100% mistake. if you keep your insistence, you just give them bad impression. you need their help. they don't need to help you legally, because it is not their mistake. probably, they ignore your selfish insistence as business manner. but, I am sure that it may influence how much they help you or that they just formally pretend to help you as businesslike.
that is business way in Japan.

your purpose is "recovering money".
don't forget that they have no responsibility to recover your money from the recipient legally.

My advice is ask a japanese lawyer / attorney what are your options in this case. This system when banks are using same account numbers and only change the branch code is quite stupid and literally asking for mistakes so this must be not uncommon problem...

Usually when one tries to make a remittance, one needs to make sure of four things - bank name, branch name, account number, and the recipientfs name. If one misses just the branch number, then it is likely to be rejected because there is no recipient under that number & recipient name, in which case the bank would contact you.

However, in your case, you sent it without confirming the recipientfs name (that most likely appeared on the screen) - and if you didnft get a call from your bank telling you it was rejected, it must have gone through to the account holder at another branch.

In this case, the bank fulfilled their obligation by routing the remittance to the one specified by you, and the recipient just found the amount in their account, though they donft know why.

The only thing your bank can do now is to attempt to contact the account holder, requesting that the amount be returned - which might be taking some time. Best wishes, but really all you can do is to wait.

OP says here a lie that the receiver's name was not shown on the screen.
it was shown.
https://www.sbishinseibank.co.jp/service/newpd/guide/furikomi_sp.html
see step5.
she did agree with the sending to the wrong account.

when she want money back,
1. call the bank immediately.
2. she needs to take paperwork for requesting the money back.
the bank tries to contact the receiver. when the receiver agrees with returning money,
3. the receiver needs to take paperwork for agreement of money return.
it takes some time and those are unnecessary and unexpected work for the receiver.
all correction will be done by their goodwill.
therefore, she needs to APPRECIATE the bank and the receiver, when it is done successfully.

well, problems of foreigner's logics are that they believe that, when they made faults, those faults can be compensated by complaining other things. those behaviors make things more complicated in many cases.

Hello, I've been in the same situation right now. May i know what happened? Did you get your money back and what did you do to get it back? As for me, it's been 20 days and i haven't received any call from my bank so i am starting to lose hope. I am considering to ask help to a lawyer and hopefully not spend too much money as i am not that rich. Any advise?