MTGOX took $1000USD out of my account, said 'accidently sent a withdrawal 2x'

[mike85123]

I got this from MtGox Support on March 19th:

Adam, Mar 19 15:12 (JST):
It appears that we have sent you a double withdrawal of USD $1,000.00 on [removed].

Please kindly send this amount back to your Mt.Gox account so that your balance on the Mt.Gox account can be adjusted accordingly. The end of March is the end of the financial year here in Japan and therefore, we need to get our balances correct for auditing. Thank you once again and our apologies for the urgency.

Thanks,

MtGox.com Team

The removed is a hex string xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx - what does this refer to? can I use this to track what they are talking about??

My MtGox account has $-9xx.00 now after their bullshit (I had like $25 in the account before).

After providing them multiple screenshots of my Dwolla Account showing that all of the deposits matched and there were no duplicates, it has been more than a week and still nothing. I got a response today saying they are still "finding out a couple information on our end."

I have a couple hundred BTC in the account, and tried to transfer them out so they couldn't sell them to zero out the balance, but BTC withdrawals are blocked when an account has a negative balance. So they are holding my couple hundred BTC hostage until they correct this.

They try this on anyone else? What should I do? Can Dwolla help with this?

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[Extravagant]

Wow that really sounds like some bull.

Sounds like they accidently debited the wrong account and are trying to save there butt.

What i am trying to figure out is, MTGox is a bitcoin exchange basically, The type of funding used to buy and sell coin is kinda second.

Another-wards why would they be debiting accounts USD anyway? They deal in BTC not USD or Pounds or w/e. Why would they be dealing with peoples money.

maybe i am just confused.

Hope you figure it out man. thats really crappy!

[guruvan]

I would gather up all your evidence of transfers in and out of your MtGox account, and take it to them.
Yes, I would get everything from the Mt.Gox end, and the Dwolla end.

MagicalTux here is on their team.

(sigh. considering they've still not found my last withdrawal, I'm pretty much done there. This is getting to be toooooo frequent for them to not know where the money went)

[rjk]

I don't know if it is applicable in this case, but Dwolla has been known to fuck around with balances and statements to hide various errors on their end or to cover up fraud.

[repentance]

I got this from MtGox Support on March 19th:

Adam, Mar 19 15:12 (JST):
It appears that we have sent you a double withdrawal of USD $1,000.00 on [removed].

Please kindly send this amount back to your Mt.Gox account so that your balance on the Mt.Gox account can be adjusted accordingly. The end of March is the end of the financial year here in Japan and therefore, we need to get our balances correct for auditing. Thank you once again and our apologies for the urgency.

Thanks,

MtGox.com Team

The removed is a hex string xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx - what does this refer to? can I use this to track what they are talking about??

My MtGox account has $-9xx.00 now after their bullshit (I had like $25 in the account before).

After providing them multiple screenshots of my Dwolla Account showing that all of the deposits matched and there were no duplicates, it has been more than a week and still nothing. I got a response today saying they are still "finding out a couple information on our end."

I have a couple hundred BTC in the account, and tried to transfer them out so they couldn't sell them to zero out the balance, but BTC withdrawals are blocked when an account has a negative balance. So they are holding my couple hundred BTC hostage until they correct this.

They try this on anyone else? What should I do? Can Dwolla help with this?

Their email is a bit confusing.  I would expect a "double withdrawal of $1000" to mean that $1000 was withdrawn from your account twice, which should put your account at $19XX DR.  That's clearly not what they mean at all as your account is only $9XX overdrawn, so what the hell are they talking about when they say "double withdrawal"?

It sounds like today's response wasn't written by a native English speaker.  I'd suggest dealing with Adam or Mark and asking for a copy of their records for transactions on your account.  It sounds like they have wrongly debited your MtGox account but sent the funds to someone else's Dwolla account - they should have a record of the Dwolla account to which the funds were sent.

Another-wards why would they be debiting accounts USD anyway? They deal in BTC not USD or Pounds or w/e. Why would they be dealing with peoples money.

People have to put money into their MtGox accounts to buy BTC and when they sell BTC they sell them to other MtGox users for money.  People frequently withdraw the money they have made from selling BTC, there's nothing odd about that.  MtGox does not "deal" in anything.  You are not buying BTC from MtGox when your purchase them through the exchange, you're buying them from and selling them to other users.

[mike85123]

I have traced every Gox->Dwolla transfer and every Dwolla->my bank transfer. There are zero dollars left over. No duplicate transactions.

They are saying that I setup a single Gox->Dwolla transfer for $1,000. They then say that they accidentally put $1,000 in my dwolla account TWICE.

Had Gox double sent money to my Dwolla account I would have noticed within a day.

To me it seems awfully fishy that they said their fiscal year ends March 31 and now it seems they are stalling. 

[Mt.Gox Support]

I have traced every Gox->Dwolla transfer and every Dwolla->my bank transfer. There are zero dollars left over. No duplicate transactions.

They are saying that I setup a single Gox->Dwolla transfer for $1,000. They then say that they accidentally put $1,000 in my dwolla account TWICE.

Had Gox double sent money to my Dwolla account I would have noticed within a day.

To me it seems awfully fishy that they said their fiscal year ends March 31 and now it seems they are stalling. 

Hi, I have check this with MagicalTux and you should be in the clear now, could you please check your account? The problem was Dwolla's API which is, everything but reliable, and to give you an idea of the damage, some people had up to 6 identical withdrawal. Luckily we have things under control and accounts should be fine now.

As for the fiscal year is concerned many countries, including Japan does not follow European or North American calendar and in Japan the fiscal year ends March 31 and Start April 1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_calendar) 

The first day of April has broad significance in Japan. It marks the beginning of the government's fiscal year. Many corporations follow suit. In addition, corporations often form or merge on that date. In recent years, municipalities have preferred it for mergers. On this date, many new employees begin their jobs, and it is the start of many real-estate leases. The school year begins on April 1.

[mike85123]

Crazy how it took this post to fix this (it is fixed, fyi).

Why not do your investigation first and then go after the money when you are SURE THERE WAS AN ERROR? Nothing good can come from 'shoot first, ask questions later.'

Why did it take the fucking idiots at support.mtgox.com 8 days to not come up with an answer but it took you 15 minutes?

I just pulled all of my BTC from MtGox and not sure if I will use it again thanks to this little hostage situation. Go ahead and PM me with a nice permanent fee discount and I will consider coming back.

[Eveofwar]

Crazy how it took this post to fix this (it is fixed, fyi).

Why not do your investigation first and then go after the money when you are SURE THERE WAS AN ERROR? Nothing good can come from 'shoot first, ask questions later.'

Why did it take the fucking idiots at support.mtgox.com 8 days to not come up with an answer but it took you 15 minutes?

I just pulled all of my BTC from MtGox and not sure if I will use it again thanks to this little hostage situation. Go ahead and PM me with a nice permanent fee discount and I will consider coming back.

It's amazing how fast the turn around time at MtGox is when you bring things publicly to the forums.  Sad, but true.

[Starlightbreaker]

hah, it's resolved way faster than my issue with mtgox & paxum back then.

3 damn months to get stuff done.

[mike85123]

As for the fiscal year is concerned many countries, including Japan does not follow European or North American calendar and in Japan the fiscal year ends March 31 and Start April 1 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_calendar) 

The first day of April has broad significance in Japan. It marks the beginning of the government's fiscal year. Many corporations follow suit. In addition, corporations often form or merge on that date. In recent years, municipalities have preferred it for mergers. On this date, many new employees begin their jobs, and it is the start of many real-estate leases. The school year begins on April 1.

I am not worried when your fiscal year ends. I was worried that March 31 would come and go with no results and I would get an email from support saying 'well that happened last fiscal year, so we can't change anything.' Or that you were trying to cook the books for whatever reason... Or that this had happened to many other users who hadn't realized that you were wrong and just said 'okay here is another $1,000 to take care of my zero balance.' I hope you haven't incorrectly reversed double transactions to any of your other users...

[guruvan]

Crazy how it took this post to fix this (it is fixed, fyi).

Why not do your investigation first and then go after the money when you are SURE THERE WAS AN ERROR? Nothing good can come from 'shoot first, ask questions later.'

Why did it take the fucking idiots at support.mtgox.com 8 days to not come up with an answer but it took you 15 minutes?

I just pulled all of my BTC from MtGox and not sure if I will use it again thanks to this little hostage situation. Go ahead and PM me with a nice permanent fee discount and I will consider coming back.

It's amazing how fast the turn around time at MtGox is when you bring things publicly to the forums.  Sad, but true.

All of the above are the reasons my MtGox account is unfunded.
- support was unhelpful at best, and just closed and marked resolved a completely unsolved issue
- support was not responsive until I let them know I was bringing the issue here
- my issue is still unresolved after about 2 weeks.
- the amount of money is not significant, the lack of service on MtGox's part is very significant, especially when viewed in light of the near constant complaints I see about them.

I removed all my funds when they failed to process a small w/d. After 2 weeks, repeated support contact, and contact on the forum here, it is still unresolved. Mt.Gox would have to do something extraordinary to get me to do business with them again. If I can't trust you with a few satoshis, why would I trust you with real amounts of money? (If you're unable to process w/d under a certain amount safely, then STATE this and don't permit it! Don't give me some song and dance about WHY you can't find the money. Give me some of yours. Quit fucking around and making the interest off MY money by not giving it to me when I want it. Excuses don't cut it. Mt.Gox, you're acting like a BANK and I don't use those anymore.

I really like bitcoinica. They PAY me to keep my money there.

As CryptoXchange has lowered their fees, and apparently removed the objectionable casino partner, I will likely give them a go again

[Polvos]

Seems MtGox is full of shit nowadays.   

[stochastic]

This should teach you to never leave money in your mtgox account.  If you transfer money to mtgox from dwolla then just leave money in dwolla until you need it.  It only takes a few minutes to transfer the money.  If you have bitcoins, send them to a wallet somewhere else like GLBSE and make some interest on your sitting bitcoins.

[guruvan]

If you have bitcoins, send them to a wallet somewhere else like GLBSE and make some interest on your sitting bitcoins.

+10

[Kluge]

(CDs, 5% to 6% MPR, free "currency risk insurance," money goes back into the BTC community, just sayin')

[JoelKatz]

Why not do your investigation first and then go after the money when you are SURE THERE WAS AN ERROR? Nothing good can come from 'shoot first, ask questions later.'

I won't defend their actions in this specific case, but I will explain what's wrong with your logic -- the first thing you must do when you're not sure what's going on with a financial system you operate that handles other people's money is stop any assets from leaving your control.

Until they know for sure otherwise, someone could be trying to steal from you. Or you could be trying to steal from them. Or a whole bunch of other uncool things.

For some reason, the free association engine in my brain thought this story would teach this lesson, though I'm not sure exactly why I thought that. - http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/Special-Delivery.aspx

[muyuu]

You guys still have significant amounts in MtGox?

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Why not do your investigation first and then go after the money when you are SURE THERE WAS AN ERROR? Nothing good can come from 'shoot first, ask questions later.'

I won't defend their actions in this specific case, but I will explain what's wrong with your logic -- the first thing you must do when you're not sure what's going on with a financial system you operate that handles other people's money is stop any assets from leaving your control.

Until they know for sure otherwise, someone could be trying to steal from you. Or you could be trying to steal from them. Or a whole bunch of other uncool things.

For some reason, the free association engine in my brain thought this story would teach this lesson, though I'm not sure exactly why I thought that. - http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/Special-Delivery.aspx

Still reading, but believe I found where he erred.

Æxecor traded coal on only one exchange (the WTFSE),...

[phantomcircuit]

Why not do your investigation first and then go after the money when you are SURE THERE WAS AN ERROR? Nothing good can come from 'shoot first, ask questions later.'

I won't defend their actions in this specific case, but I will explain what's wrong with your logic -- the first thing you must do when you're not sure what's going on with a financial system you operate that handles other people's money is stop any assets from leaving your control.

Until they know for sure otherwise, someone could be trying to steal from you. Or you could be trying to steal from them. Or a whole bunch of other uncool things.

For some reason, the free association engine in my brain thought this story would teach this lesson, though I'm not sure exactly why I thought that. - http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/Special-Delivery.aspx

++ for special delivery, epic fail