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A POSTMAN has told how his life was turned upside down after a massive bank error put his account a MILLION pounds in debt.
Azhar Bhutta, 38, logged on to his Barclays app on Monday expecting to see his usual balance of about £1,000 – but instead discovered a huge blunder.
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His main account was overdrawn by £498,764.27 – and his instant ISA savings account was down £499,999.11.
Barclays has now suspended his account while they investigate the bizarre situation – forcing him to open a new account at HSBC.
Azhar told Mail Online: “The whole thing has been a nightmare. I feel like my life has been turned upside down when I have done nothing wrong.
“It was the worst feeling in my life when I saw that each of my accounts were overdrawn by around £500,000.
“But the effects of my account being suspended and all my direct debits being cancelled are even worse. It is causing me a major headache trying to sort everything out.”
Azhar had been trying to send his wife Katarzyna, 42, some money when he discovered the whopping minus figure.
He explained: “I didn’t know what to do and I couldn’t think straight. It was an amount of money that I could never even dream of, and my app was saying that I owed it to the bank.
“It was shocking because I have never been in debt before in my life, and I have never ever missed any payments on my mortgage or anything.”
Azhar’s account normally has an overdraft allowance of just £3,400 – which made Barclays staff just as confused as him.
He was told they were registering his account as “high risk” and that it would be refered to the fraud team.
Six-hour later Azhar’s account balances had returned to normal.
But yesterday he discovered he was locked out of his Barclays app – and all of his direct debits have been cancelled.
After another phone call to Barclays, he learnt all his accounts had been suspended, pending a fraud investigation.
He says he repeatedly asked how the error occured – but was told “We don’t have to give you any explanation”.
The situation has put a lot of stress on Azhar, who works as a postie in Bracknell, Berkshire.
He explained: “I am really worried that I am going to miss a payment to someone and mess up my credit rating.
“I currently re-mortgage my house every two years to get the best deal, and I am worried that it could affect that.
“It looks like Barclays are treating me as if I done something wrong and they are trying to hide an error in their system.”
The Sun have approached Barclays for comment.
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