Charles Schwab has sued a former customer that it says won't return over $1.2 million to the firm after she received it by accident due to a software error by the company.
In a complaint filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, Schwab alleges ex-client Kelyn Spadoni of Harvey, Louisiana, was guilty of breach of contract because she "refuses to return more than $1.2 million that was inadvertently transferred to her Fidelity Brokerage Services account by Schwab."
On Feb. 23, "due to an issue created by a software enhancement, Schwab mistakenly transferred these funds" to the defendant, according to the complaint. "Immediately after learning of the transfer, Schwab has contacted Fidelity and Spadoni repeatedly to request return of the funds."
On or about Feb. 18, Schwab installed an enhancement to the software it uses for transferring assets to other broker-dealers, according to the complaint. The enhancement "inadvertently caused excess cash to be added to a pending transfer request to Spadoni," Schwab explained.
Of the $1,205,619.56 accidentally transferred to Spadoni, "only $82.56 was properly transferred," so she ended up receiving an overpayment of $1,205,536.84, according to the complaint.
"Fidelity has reported it is unable to return the funds because they are not available" and "Spadoni has refused to take Schwab's calls, and instead, she has taken steps to prevent Schwab from recovering the funds," according to the complaint.
