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Home> Life

Published 16:00 26 Jun 2023 GMT+1

Woman who had £31 million transferred into her bank account by mistake had big plans for the money

The Texan mum-of-two thought she was quids in after receiving £31 million pounds in her bank account.

Katherine Sidnell

Katherine Sidnell

A Texan woman got the shock of her life when her bank mistakenly transferred over $37 million dollars to her account.

Ruth Balloon stumbled across the staggering sum as she checked her bank account, leaving the mum-of-two a multi-millionaire - albeit only briefly.

Ruth Balloon became a millionaire in an instant.
ABC13

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Whilst most of us would have disappeared into the sunset after getting that deposit, the 35-year-old did return the money and joked that she’d had ‘big plans’ for the sudden windfall.

At the time, Balloon had been finishing a shift at the Roma Boots boutique in Dallas when her life suddenly changed – with an extra $37 million (£31m) to spare.

Recalling the moment, she told CBS Texas that she was initially just in shock telling them: “Wow, we have a lot of money'!"

Given that the life-changing sum had suddenly appeared, Balloon hoped that she had been ‘really gifted’ with the lucky windfall.

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Deep down though, she knew it was too good to be true and took a breath before reaching out to her husband, Brian.

Unlike the sales assistant though, her spouse was less excited with Brian believing the millions of dollars were a scam and he immediately called their bank, LegacyTexas.

The couple were later told that a bank clerical error had occurred, with a teller punching in the account number instead of the figure – resulting in the staggering sum.

After realising the accounting error, the local bank apologised and removed millions of dollars from the couple’s account.

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The mum-of-two even took a screenshot of her lucky windfall.
ABC13

Given that it had taken a few hours for the mistake to be rectified, Balloon had more than enough time to imagine how she’d spend the millions.

"First I was going to do 10% tithing. Then I was going to donate some money and then I would have invested in real estate,” she revealed during the interview but knew that she’d have to return the funds.

"Even if the amount was a real transfer, I knew the money did not belong to us. I could not spend money that does not belong to us,” she added: “I did daydream of what I would do with it if I did have it."

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Whilst the millions might be gone, the mum-of-two did admit to taking a screenshot as proof of the strange story.

"I was a millionaire, I have a screenshot of it so I can say that now, it's quite a story!" Balloon joked, adding that she hoped the bank would give her a reward for her honesty.

"A 'thank you' reward would be a little bit good. Just for being a good customer and notifying them as soon as possible," Balloon told news crews.

We couldn’t agree more.

Featured Image Credit: ABC13

Topics: News, US News, Life, Real Life, Money

Katherine Sidnell
Katherine Sidnell

Katherine is an entertainment journalist with a love of all things nerdy. Starting out writing Doctor Who fan fiction as a kid, she has gone on to interview the likes of Matt Damon, James May and Dua Lipa to name a few. Published in The Sun, The Daily Mail and Evening Standard - she now joins Ladbible as resident nerd in chief.

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@ksidnell

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