A computer glitch has been held responsible for the poker machine-like behaviour a number of Australian Commonwealth Bank ATMs displayed yesterday. Sydney saw queues of up to 50 people assembling to have a go at the machines. This obviously attracted a police presence because many simply couldn’t contain themselves.

ATMs were basically giving away free money when you went to draw cash. Twitter frothed with eager punters.

Clearly it was all going to be too good to be true though. This according to a Commonwealth Bank spokesperson:

If they are a customer that has legitimately overdrawn their account, we certainly won’t be charging them fees for doing so. But there are customers that have gone out and deliberately overdrawn by several hundred dollars.

Apparently one guy even called a local radio station to say a couple of his mates that had only had a few dollars left in their accounts quietly withdrew $500 each.

New South Wales police said more than 40 Commonwealth Bank ATMs had been affected by the glitch and that unfortunately people that received more cash than they requested would need to return it.

The mild eight hour interruption also had a major effect on usual month end banking behaviour and no doubt a few apologies and explanations will be necessary.

[Source: Sydney Morning Herald]