It all started with a wooden door.
In 2020, Amanda Ferragine found a solid-oak wooden door for sale on Facebook Marketplace and paid the $50 for the transaction.
The owner of the door, Christina Rolston of Queensville, gladly accepted the e-transferred funds and handed the door over when Ferragine drove from Bradford to Jackson’s Point to pick it up.
That would be the end of a beautiful seller/purchaser arrangement, except a year later Ferragine made a mistake.
After buying windows from Comfort Home Windows for her new house in October 2021, Ferragine agreed to pay the bill by Interac e-transfer in $3,000 increments.
However, when she hit send, she mistakenly clicked on Christina Rolston's account instead of Comfort's as they were next to each other alphabetically in her contact list.
Amanda called Rolston to explain the error, yet Rolston responded negatively to the requested return of the funds erroneously dumped into her account.
“She was like, accusatory,” said Ferragine, “(She said) “How do I know you’re not fraudulent? How do I know you’re not trying to scam me?”
Amanda said she attempted to refresh Christina’s memory about their previous contact but eventually decided to deal directly with her bank to have the funds returned to her account.
But she was told by a variety of Scotiabank personnel that the bank does not get involved with third-party transactions, including those for Interac e-transfers.
Doug Johnson, Scotiabank’s senior manager of Canadian banking communications, advised patrons to be aware of the pitfalls of e-transfers.
“We encourage all customers to use caution and conduct proper due diligence by verifying details of a transaction when sending electronic money transfers to other parties,” Johnson said.
Amanda told her husband, Bradford West Gwillimbury Ward 5 Coun. Peter Ferragine who attempted to reach out to Rolston as well, as his name was on the e-transfer email Rolston had received when the money was deposited.
Peter said he sent her an email explaining the step-by-step procedures they had attempted to ensure their money was returned to them – including giving the bank updated email address information – but he says Rolston either hung up or refused to answer the phone and let it go to voicemail.
“I left a long message for her stating exactly what had been done and the next steps I’m going to take - and it’s going to include legal action,” Peter said.
On Rolston’s part, she said she’s working with her RBC bank to attempt to return the funds to the Ferragines.
“It is a difficult process and I cannot tell you how much of my personal time, including this time, that I have spent trying to rectify this,” Rolston said. “I have sent them e-transfers, they have a problem with their email on their bank’s end.”
Rolston went on to say she has washed her hands of the banking snafu.
“At the end of the day, this is in the bank’s hands and I have given them full authority to take the money out of my account and transfer it to them. It’s the bank if anything that’s wrong,” she said.
After nine weeks of inaction, the South Simcoe Police (SSP) have been alerted to the missing funds.
SSP’s corporate communications coordinator, Sue Sgambati, said an officer has spoken with the Ferragines and is currently expecting a response about the next steps they’d like to take.
“We’re awaiting more information from the complainant, and it would be a theft investigation we’d be conducting,” she said.
Peter said he’d like to see more people ensure there is a password in place before sending money by e-transfer, and Amanda said she’d now seek out other means of paying for a large sum.
“You know what? If I had known better, I probably would have went and got the cheque book and done it that way.”
