Resident overpaid £300,000 in Fife Council blunder

A new checking procedure has been installed in Fife Council's finance system after almost £300,000 was deposited into a member of the public's account by mistake.

The person was due to receive £59.95 a month but a typing error meant £59,395 was lodged into their bank instead.

The payments were made five times during July and August before council officials discovered the error.

The council has now recovered all but £12,000 of the cash.

The council said it had set up a repayment plan for the rest of the money.

Jacqueline Armitage, Fife Council's service manager, said: "Unfortunately a keying error resulted in the wrong payment being issued and, as it was set up as an automatically recurring payment, multiple payments were made.

"The incorrect recurring payment should have been picked up as part of our normal checks, so we've now put an additional reporting mechanism in place to create a dual-checking system.

"We retrieved the majority of the funds and have agreed a repayment plan for the outstanding amount."