An Irish citizen opened up about his confusion after almost €200 million arrived in his Revolut app.
Last week, Kevin Conway opened his phone app and saw that €197,245,088 had been deposited into his ‘vault’, a method of saving money through the app.
The heartstopping error was displayed for around two hours before it was rectified. The Co Wexford man checked the app several times without the giant amount changing and said that the actual balance should have been around €200.
“It was around 3pm or 4pm on Friday of last week and I checked my app and it said I had a balance of €197m.
“Then all of a sudden it was gone.
“I didn’t know what to do. I was scratching my head. I was €200m richer for two hours there,” He told RTE News
Mr. Conway was using his Revolut account mainly for small transactions and travel.
Revolut described it as a “temporary bug” and stressed that even though the €200 million were displayed, the error meant that the cash would not have been withdrawable or available in any way to Mr. Conway.
“This had no impact on the funds in that account and the error was quickly corrected by a customer support agent,” A spokesman said.
The almost lucky man revealed that a Revolut customer service agent had joked to him that they wished the incredible sum had been real.
“I wish we could do it. I would make myself rich and you as well,” she wrote in a webchat.
However, this isn’t the first such case, as in previous years Ireland has seen customers benefiting from transaction and banking errors where money has incorrectly been deposited into their accounts.
But some of the people who went ahead and spent the money, have been prosecuted.
23-year-old single mom Margaret McDonnell from Finglas, Dublin went on a “massive spending spree” between the 7th and the 16th of March 2013 after a bank mistakenly deposited €51,000 into her account.
McDonnell spent the cash on clothes, shoes and other items for her two children and received a suspended jail sentence in April of 2017.
For RTE News’ video coverage of the story, you can check the link below.
Co Wexford man €200m richer for two hours before error rectified | https://t.co/KkaFlPpTxO pic.twitter.com/DfT0GOM580
— RTÉ News (@rtenews) August 28, 2019
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