Note: Readers, thank you for your comments. If you’re here to find out how you can get your money back from BDO after a DWD experience, please jump to the Comment by CJ at the end of this post by clicking on that link.

At another ATM machine at SM Sucat, Bldg B, the one by the escalator, just outside a BDO Branch. What is it with BDO and Unionbank?!

OK call me stupid for attempting to withdraw my money on a BDO ATM with a non-BDO card/account. But if you shop at SM Sucat there is hardly any other choice. Partly I blame Unionbank for not having enough ATM machines around the city to be convenient for its depositors, but that’s beside the point. It’s not my card either, because I have managed to withdraw my money at OTHER non-Unionbank ATM machines with no issues at all.

Has BDO marked my Unionbank EON Payroll card as undesirable? Have they singled out this card as their one prey to victimize? This is also strange because I have transacted with BDO ATMs successfully several times before with no issues at all, prior to the previous incident of debit without dispense that happened late last month.

And as that has been resolved I had put it down to a technical glitch at that particular ATM machine. But now it seems that another BDO ATM machine has got it in for me. Or maybe the entire BDO ATM system!

Now I know why I should make a balance inquiry prior to a withdrawal, it’s not because I need to find out how much I have in my account, but to make sure that the stupid BDO ATM machine can communicate with my bank. But that means giving BDO 2 pesos and I didn’t want to do that after last month’s fiasco. So I attempted a withdrawal. After a long wait the BDO ATM Screen said “Unable to get a response from your bank” and spit out my card, with no receipt. So I attempted a balance inquiry, which got the same response on the screen, and still no receipt.

Thinking that no transaction had taken place at all I went on with my life with the cash I had left. This was yesterday afternoon. Today I looked at my account online and realized that the P900 I attempted to withdraw was indeed debited, again with the P12 transaction charge.

I reported the matter to Unionbank as soon as I realized it. They filed my complaint, gave me my reference number and said they would pass it on to their ATM Center who will deal with BDO’s ATM Center.

I then called BDO’s Customer Care who—just like the first time this happened to me—said that there is no record of my transaction.

This is something that I cannot comprehend with both instances that the debit without dispense happened to me at a BDO ATM machine.

Why is there no record of the transaction, but THERE IS A TRANSACTION FEE DEDUCTED? Is this a system flaw in BDO’s ATM machine software?

If the BDO ATM Machine was “unable to get a response” from my bank, why was my account deducted the amount and charged the transaction fee?

In my opinion this is a SERIOUS SYSTEM FLAW in the BDO ATM machines that I have transacted on, two different machines in the same SM Sucat Bldg B.

I’m sure I will not see my P900 back before the new year, as the last banking day of 2008 is on the 24th of December. But since I got my money the first time this happened, I am a little confident that I will get it back this time as well.

But things like this should not be happening, and if BDO insists that only their ATM Machines are on SM Malls premises then they must make sure that people will want to use their machines. While BDO have made their ATM machines and branches as ubiquitous as the common housefly, incidents such as these raise the question of BDO’s honesty and sincerity in serving the people who use their services for a fee.

I had received in one of my e-groups a message from a former BDO depositor. Former, because at a time when he thought he had enough money in his account for the minimum maintaining balance. However, he relates that during that time BDO raised its average maintaining balance, which made his account fall below the required balance. He got no notices from BDO regarding this. When the time came that he wanted to make a deposit he discovered that his account had been closed. BDO had been deducting the fine from his account without his knowing it, to a point that the account was closed.

Debit without dispense. Accounts closed without the depositor being notified. If that doesn’t raise one’s apprehensions about being a BDO depositor, then BDO can do what it bloody well wants and no one, depositor or otherwise, can do anything about it.