Man ( Jon Lim ) Returns S$88,000 Back To Smith & Nephew

shiokalingam · Apr 26, 2015

Man returns $88,000 sent to bank account

Man returns $88,000 wrongfully transferred to his account, says it was right thing to do

Apr 24, 2015 6:00am

By: GAO WENXIN

When more than $88,000 was wrongly transferred to his bank account, his friends could not believe his luck and told him to keep the windfall.

But Mr Jon Lim, 31, didn't think twice about returning the money.

The transaction, made on March 27, turned out to be a Giro transfer from British-based medical equipment company Smith & Nephew, which has an office in Singapore.

It took him several days of calling the office to get through to someone who confirmed there had been an error in the bank transfer.

After he returned the money, Smith & Nephew sent him an e-mail to acknowledge it. The brief e-mail read: "Hi Jon, We had (sic) received below fund (sic) yesterday. Thank you very much."

Read the full report in our print edition on April 24.

- See more at: http://www.tnp.sg/news/singapore-news/man-returns-88000-sent-bank-account#sthash.vSAIHcm0.dpuf

shiokalingam · Apr 26, 2015

Man returns $88,000 wrongfully transferred to his account

Sunday, April 26, 2015 - 07:30

Gao Wenxin

The New Paper

When more than $88,000 was wrongly transferred to his bank account, his friends could not believe his luck and told him to pocket the windfall.

But Mr Jon Lim didn't think twice about returning it.

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Transaction error? Here's what to do

The 31-year-old was working late at home on the night of March 27, a Friday, when he received a text message from his bank saying that $88,593.31 had been credited to his account.

He initially thought the money could have been commission earned in his job as a financial adviser.

But he could not recall working on a deal that would generate such a large commission, so he started having doubts the money was meant for him.

The transaction turned out to be a Giro transfer from British-based medical equipment company Smith & Nephew, which has an office in Singapore.

As Mr Lim had no previous dealings with the company, it became clear to him that Smith & Nephew had committed an expensive mistake.

Though the money was more than half of what he makes in a year, he decided to return it to the company.

Mr Lim told The New Paper: "It was an immediate decision because it wasn't my money and it could have been important to someone else."

Man returns $88,000 wrongfully transferred to his account

He did the right thing because anyone who keeps money that has been wrongly credited into a bank account is committing an offence.

Before Mr Lim found out where the money had come from, he was worried because of the large amount involved, said his sister, Ms Ezann Lim, 28.

"He actually called our parents' home to ask if any of us had transferred the money to him," she said.

"He has a baby daughter so his immediate reaction was: 'What if it belonged a mother who was paying for her child's hospital bills?' He would feel guilt-stricken if someone got into trouble or come into harm because of this."

Mr Lim said several friends and family members, including his wife, thought it might have been a money-laundering scam and advised him to leave the money in his account until the bank contacted him again.

His friends in the financial sector even came up with ways to keep the money, such as withdrawing it and then closing the bank account.

Miss Lim said: "They thought my brother was siao (Hokkien for crazy) to return it.

"If it had happened to me, I don't think I would have been so straightforward as to try to return the money the same day."

Ms Lim said the money would have meant a lot to her brother because he has a young child and had just moved to a new four-room flat that is only "minimally renovated".

NOT TEMPTED

But Mr Lim was never tempted to take what was not his, even when his attempts to return the money proved to be more difficult than he thought.

When he called the Smith & Nephew office that Friday night, it had closed for the day.

Nobody picked up the phone when he tried again the following Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday.

On Thursday, April 2, he finally got through to someone who confirmed there had been an error in the bank transfer.

Mr Lim said since he and Smith & Nephew use different banks, he could return the money only by cheque or a cashier's order. He had misplaced his cheque book and only managed to return the money via a cashier's order on April 16.

The next day, Smith & Nephew sent him an e-mail to acknowledge it had received the money. The brief e-mail read: "Hi Jon, We had (sic) received below fund (sic) yesterday. Thank you very much."

Mr Lim's friend, Mr Ang Wilin, 29, felt the company should have made a bigger gesture in appreciation of Mr Lim's honesty and efforts to return the money.

Mr Ang, who was shocked by the large amount involved, said: "I used to work in the banking sector and cases like this usually involve just a few hundred dollars.

"It was not Jon's mistake, but he went through so much trouble just to rectify it.

"There should have been a bigger gesture of appreciation from the company as it was no small sum."

A spokesman for the Singapore Kindness Movement commended Mr Lim's act, saying: "It was good of him to return the money and it speaks well of our society."

However, the spokesman said it was up to the company how it wished to show its appreciation since it had benefited from Mr Lim's act of kindness.

After three days of calling, TNP finally got through to Smith & Nephew's local office and spoke to the senior finance executive who had dealt with Mr Lim's case.

She said she did not know how the error occurred and declined to comment further.

Mr Lim said he has no hard feelings as it was only the right thing to do.

"I didn't expect anything in return," he said.

OTHER CASES OF HONESTY

$1 million in cash

In November 2012, cabby Sia Ka Tian found $1.1 million, in $1,000 bills, in a black paper bag in his taxi.

The money was left behind by his passengers, a Thai couple who were on holiday here.

When Mr Sia discovered the money, he reported it to ComfortDelGro's lost-and-found department, where his colleagues were stunned by the huge sum.

To express their gratitude, the grateful couple gave Mr Sia a reward for his honesty.

ComfortDelGro also gave him a good service award.

$370,000 in gold bars

In March 2009, cabby Lim Heng Long returned $377,000 worth of gold bars that were left in the boot of his taxi by British jewellery dealer Hemant Soni.

After realising he had misplaced the bag containing the 5kg of gold bars, Mr Soni went to the police for help.

ComfortDelGro managed to track down Mr Lim's cab.

Mr Soni insisted on giving Mr Lim a reward of $50 - an offer the cabby initially refused.

Mr Lim was also given a good service award by ComfortDelGro.

shiokalingam · Apr 26, 2015

Bros n Sis

Smith & Nephew how come so careless ???

Smith & Nephew Using Which Bank ???

Thank you.

Jah_rastafar_I · Apr 26, 2015

The co is very lucky it's a chinese person they transferred it to. If they transferred the account to shit skins or m&ds that's it. Of course not saying all chinese people are honest but they are lucky this person is a chinese working professional rather than a hokkien peng.

The saddest thing about this is most people won't praise him for his honesty since he is chinese. If he happened to be a m&d or a shit skin he would be praised even more and chinese dogs would be praising him to the skies. If he's chinese then just say yeah honest guy end of story.

virus · Apr 26, 2015

he lucky. if you find such sums in yr account better return then wait for cpib to get it back from you with free food and lodging reward for your honesty nevermind if you truly believe the transfer was made in good fraud, i mean good faith

shiokalingam · Apr 26, 2015

Smith & Nephew

http://www.smith-nephew.com/investor-centre/about-us/our-history/

The Group has a history dating back over 150 years

to the family enterprise of Thomas James Smith who opened a small pharmacy in Hull,

England in 1856. On his death in 1896, his nephew Horatio Nelson Smith

took over the management of the business.

Image: Thomas James Smith

A few days after the declaration of World War 1 in 1914, Horatio Nelson Smith (the nephew of the company founder T. J Smith) met with an envoy of the French President in London. The company was awarded a contract to supply £350,000 of surgical and field dressings, to be delivered in five months.

By the late 1990s, Smith & Nephew had expanded into being a diverse healthcare conglomerate with operations across the globe, including various medical devices, personal care products and traditional and advanced woundcare treatments. In 1998, Smith & Nephew announced a major restructuring to focus management attention and investment on three business units — wound management, endoscopy and orthopaedics— which offered high growth and margin opportunities.

Smith & Nephew was incorporated and listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1937 and in 1999 the Group was also listed on the New York Stock Exchange. In 2001, Smith & Nephew became a constituent member of the FTSE-100 index in the UK. This means that Smith & Nephew is included in the top 100 companies traded on the London Stock Exchange measured in terms of market capitalisation.

Today, Smith & Nephew is a public limited company incorporated and headquartered in the UK and doing business in many countries around the world.

http://www.smith-nephew.com/investor-centre/investor-relations-contacts/

JHolmesJr · Apr 26, 2015

Don't see any virtue here…if he hadn't returned it he would've been traced and fucked upside down. He was smart enough to see that and did the right thing.

Now, one of our hawker bros here would have taken it and run road to nakhon si thamarat, never to heard from again.

songsongjurong · Apr 26, 2015

if erroneous sender is GIC,GLC companies,Mr. jon lim be charged with hacking,money laundering,terroism support.

SBFTirak · Apr 26, 2015

Not from our resident John Tan ?

frenchbriefs · Apr 26, 2015

isnt smith & nephew a chain of handgun stores?or is that smith and wilson?

shiokalingam · Apr 26, 2015

frenchbriefs said:
isnt smith & nephew a chain of handgun stores?or is that smith and wilson?

JHolmesJr · Apr 26, 2015

Lord give me strength….. its Smith & Wesson…I personally prefer the snub nosed .38 ...fits perfectly under a dinner jacket with no obvious bulges.

xpo2015 · Apr 26, 2015

His friends are bunch of losers ask him to keep it.

If he goes to jail, they will say not their problems.

Lousy friends!!!

tonychat · Apr 26, 2015

xpo2015 said:
His friends are bunch of losers ask him to keep it.

If he goes to jail, they will say not their problems.

Lousy friends!!!

His friends must be PAP supporters..

Jon Lim must be a opposition supporter.

bushtucker · Apr 26, 2015

<<The brief e-mail read: "Hi Jon, We had (sic) received below fund (sic) yesterday. Thank you very much.">>

Smith & Nephew corp comms so lousy one ah? what a shabby reply.

The_Hypocrite · Apr 26, 2015

The thing is 88k better return as its m9re trouble than its worth with the sort of gahmen we have that will side w MNCs. However if it 8million or 800k. Where can retire indon or Thailand than by all means keep the $$. Taking money from MNCs is not a sin as they r robbers n crooks anyway.

virus said:
he lucky. if you find such sums in yr account better return then wait for cpib to get it back from you with free food and lodging reward for your honesty nevermind if you truly believe the transfer was made in good fraud, i mean good faith

Jah_rastafar_I · Apr 27, 2015

frenchbriefs said:
isnt smith & nephew a chain of handgun stores?or is that smith and wilson?

Moron spotted.

JHolmesJr said:
Lord give me strength….. its Smith & Wesson…I personally prefer the snub nosed .38 ...fits perfectly under a dinner jacket with no obvious bulges.

All because it has smith in the name doesn't automtically make it the gun company. Damn french the chinese dog sure is a moron but it's not surprising.

eatshitndie · Apr 27, 2015

"returns $88,000" is adequate. "returns $88,000 back" is superfluous and redundant.

Man ( Jon Lim ) Returns S$88,000 Back To Smith & Nephew

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