My overseas debit card was swallowed by a NAB ATM this morning due to a breakdown of this machine. The teller in NAB told me that they would return the card to me and were going to destroy it according to their policy. But this doesn't make any sense to me.
I was like, why it is me, a victim of their breakdown service, to pay for the potential loss. Because, I might need to fly overseas to apply for a new card. I also said that it is not me, but the bank itself to carry out certain investigation on their own ATM to figure out why the brakedown occured. Not simply saying, we don't know why this machine captured your card. The gentleman couldn't answer my question and conculted his manager for the solution.
A lady who was claimed to be a manager then came to me, said there was nothing she can do and asked me to leave, or she would call the security. I was surprised as I wasn't rude at all and had't done any thing wrong. Just wanted a explanation of this unfair policy.
Plus, when I checked my account, the money which I typed in has been deducted from my account, but I have not received a single cent from the ATM. I am extremly unhappy with the NAB lady's attitude. Have I done anything wrong? What am i supposed to do to have my money back?
It's standard policy for the ATM to destroy the card if it's retained by the machine. They don't want any chance of the faulty/stolen/whatever card being used again. Plus the work of having to securely send it back to the owner. So in all cases you will be issued with a new one. The branch staff cannot help you, they have nothing to do with the ATM or the card people. This has been the case for many many years. The card doesn't belong to you BTW, you'll see somewhere that it says it remains the property of the bank.
Don't worry about the balance. All the transactions are audited and they will detect that the machine didn't issue the cash and reimburse your account. But follow up with them, for sure.
It's unfortunate that it happened just as you were going to leave. You could ask the card people if they can expedite the new one for you. That's why you should have more than one card for use overseas just in case, and to test them ahead of time before you leave. I had a close shave sometime back with Citibank. Due to a series of badly timed interactions, I ended up getting 3 new cards in quick succession of which only the last one was valid. Fortunately I got that a few days before I left.