KastelCo,
You know, I had no idea that those Canadian Royalty Trusts received so much money from those oil sands companies to pay out to the trust shareholders... Perhaps I should rethink those trusts??? <g>
Canadian Oil Sands Trust (2) (C-COS) - Street Wire
Canadian Oil Sands pays Carol MacD ... ohmygod!
Canadian Oil Sands Trust (2)COS
Shares issued 79,538,258 COS.UN Aug 1 2003 close $ 37.10
Friday August 1 2003 Street Wire
by Brent Mudry
In an embarrassing banking snafu, Canadian Oil Sands Ltd. reveals it sent its chief executive officer's biweekly paycheques, to the tune of almost $210,000 over 4-1/2 months, to the wrong bank account, resulting in a brief windfall for a woman with an account at another branch. Now, Canadian Oil Sands wants Carol Diane Macdonald to repay $83,000 still unrecovered, although it does not know her address or occupation.
The comical paycheque fiasco is detailed in a suit filed Thursday by Canadian Oil Sands against Ms. MacDonald in the Supreme Court of British Columbia. The allegations in the statement of claim, filed by Vancouver lawyer Herman Van
Ommen of McCarthy Tetrault, have not yet been proven in court and a statement of defence has not yet been filed by Ms. MacDonald.
The suit notes that Canadian Oil Sands pays some of its employees by making direct deposits to their bank accounts through electronic funds transfers. "Beginning on January 15, 2003, the Plaintiff began makin (sic) direct deposits by Electronic Funds Transfers to what it thought was the account of its President and Chief Executive Officer, Marcel Coutu," states lawyer Mr. Van Ommen in the suit.
The suit notes that Mr. Coutu's account is at branch No. 010-00009 of Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. Due to an unfortunate mistake made by Canadian Oil Sands, the direct deposits were instead made to a CIBC branch with the transit No. 010-00010.
This resulted in an unexpected windfall every two weeks for Ms. MacDonald. The first mistaken deposit, on Jan. 15, was relatively small, $7,458. Had Ms. MacDonald checked her balance on Jan. 31, however, she would have found a surprise second deposit of $34,618 swelling her account. While the Feb. 14 and Feb. 28 deposits were not massive, both under $9,000, the March 14 deposit was an impressive $118,736. Three more deposits were made to the wrong account: $15,964 on March 31, $7,719 on May 15 and $6,974 on May 30. No deposits were made at all in April, with no explanation provided in the court filing.
By the time someone twigged on to what was going on, and put a stop to the matter, a total of $209,170 had been deposited in the wrong account. Fortunately, Canadian Oil Sands has been able to recover the big $118,736 payment and the final $6,974 payment.
The suit claims that Canadian Oil Sands "discovered its error" some time in June, and since then it has been paying its CEO's pay into his account, not someone else's. Canadian Oil Sands claims it has demanded Ms. MacDonald repay the remaining $83,461, with no success so far. "The defendant has no right to the funds that were mistakenly deposited into her account," states the court filing.
bmudry@stockwatch.com
(c) Copyright 2003 Canjex Publishing Ltd.
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