Revolut: 'I was careful and followed instructions closely, but still lost my crypto' – BBC

The Cryptocurrency deal was a bit fun for Tzoni Raykov, but lost $1,500 worth of management errors, causing serious concern about his treatment by the industry.

Oil engineers have been holding accounts with Revolut for several years. I used that app to split my bills with friends after going out for dinner and drinks. They pay each other using traditional currencies, such as pound sterling and USD.

However, after seeing e-money companies promote cryptocurrency services, he decided to give it a try.

What Tsani thought was an easy transfer of cryptocurrency coins made the Bulgarian public angry and left them out of their pockets.

His experience is highlighted Some of the frustration people were using cryptocurrency Many of the customer protection measures that underpin the standard online banking transactions required by law do not apply.

“When they treat you this way, it makes you feel like you can’t do anything,” he told BBC News. “May you be helpless.”

on the other hand The cryptocurrency market is dominated by Bitcoin. There are many other digital currencies, including USDC. This was already collected by Tzoni in another Crypto account.

His complaints began in February when he decided to transfer some of his USDC coins to his Revolut account.

As a precaution – suggesting that Revolut does – he first sent $10 coins to $10. It was a success and the funds were credited to his turnover account.

A few days later he tried to transfer something he thought was 1,500 USDC. The transfer has been completed, but this time the funds were not credited to his account.

Tzoni says the issue has arisen because Revolut’s deposit instructions were unknown.

If you want to transfer cryptocurrency from one account to another, you must select the network to select it. This can be the case of choosing a courier service to use when sending a parcel.

According to Revolut’s deposit instructions, to transfer USDC to it you must use a network called Polygon. His first successful, Deposito Zoni chose what was called “Polygon Pos.”

On the second deposit, when he tried to transfer 1,500 USDC, he chose another network, “Polygons (bridges).”

He thought it would work as well, but instead says he converted the coin to USDC.E – another cryptocurrency.

This is what Revolut received. The company does not process USDC.E coins.

After seeing his Revolut account not credited with 1,500 coins, Tzoni contacted the Revolut Support team.

In a message seen by BBC News, they told him the problem was “the particular type of polygon network used, which led to a conversion.”

The other is that “the app currently specifies “polygons” without distinguishing between standard and bridge options. Please be aware of feedback for future improvements. ”

Tzoni believes that if Revolut’s deposit instructions were more specific, his issues would have been avoided.

When approached by BBC News about this case, Revolut gave another answer.

The company said the issue was not because Tzoni used the wrong polygon network.

The deposit failure was not because the network itself “converted” the token,” but without explaining why the support team proposed to Zani that it was.

Revolut said the deposit ultimately failed because the USDC.E coins received were not supported by the company’s technology.

“As with standard industry practices due to the critical technical challenges involved in supporting any combination of tokens and chains, recovery of these unsupported assets is not within the scope of Revolut.”

This means that 1,500 USDC.E coins have not been credited to Tsani’s account or sent back to him.

In Zani’s mind, this is not an acceptable treatment Revolut’s size and reputation company, This handles regular bank deposits and cryptocurrency, stocks and goods.

Revolut says there are 10 million users in the UK, but last year they were granted a temporary banking license, paving the way for a full-scale UK bank.

When using a high street bank, it is usually resolved that the misdirection of traditional currency transfers are resolved and that the money is returned to the customer.

This was established in 2014 with a voluntary code of practice that most UK banks signed up to. There is no such equivalent in the cryptocurrency industry.

After contacting Revolut several times in recent weeks, Tzoni was told that the coin would be effectively lost.

“They are waiting for me to accept that I’m bored and give up and have no money left, but I won’t,” Tuni said. “It’s ridiculous that they can act like this.”

Tzoni’s cryptocurrency loss is important to him, but this total is small compared to the size of the industry, which has seen a sharp rise in value over the past 18 months.

The global market peaked at a value of 3.9 tonnes in December last year, following Donald Trump’s reelection. Since then, it has dropped by 1.1tn dollars, according to Tracking website Coingecko.

The policies of the US and other countries Changed to support the cryptocurrency industry, Though he’s suffered from some scandals.

FTX, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency companies, went bankrupt in 2022. Its CEO, Sam Bankmanfried, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison. To scam billions of dollars of customers last year.

The investigators also found that FTX manages money using QuickBooks, a popular accounting software designed for individuals and small businesses.

John Ray III, a lawyer tasked with collecting funds from FTX for fraudulent clients, told Bankruptcy Court:

He later told the Congressional hearing:

A few months ago, Bibit, the world’s second largest cryptocurrency exchange, was being fooled by some estimates. $1.5 billion worth of coins from hackers believed to work for North Korea.

As part of its business operations, the company used Safe, a free digital storage software popular with individuals who wanted to store cryptocurrency on their own devices.

Following the theft, Bybit CEO previously said “we should have upgraded and left the safety.”

One of the problems with cryptocurrency companies is that Professor Mark Button, who is investigating cybercrime, can grow very quickly. This means that you can’t keep up with the accounting and security challenges of managing a lot of money.

“For me, it shows that if you’re serious about future cryptocurrencies, then there’s some kind of regulation needed.”

In the case of Tzoni, it might have been easier to get back the cryptocurrency or get compensated if there was a law indicating that companies should need it if they were sent coins they wouldn’t process.

The higher the industry standard, the more likely it would have prevented him from making such a transaction in the first place.

Mykhailo Tiutin is the Chief Technology Officer of AMLBOT, analyzing the dangerous aspects of cryptocurrency trading.

Their services perform similar checks that are supported by banks where transfer details such as account owner name, sort code, and account number have been verified.

He says that cryptocurrencies are secure enough for the average person to use, but you need to be aware of the products and services you choose. He also says he lost his cryptocurrency after making an administrative mistake.

“You have to do your own research,” he said. “Success and losses are ultimately your own fault.”