Debbie Donaldson, Branch Manager and Sr. Escrow Officer with Chicago Title Company in Kingman, Arizona, had a sale in escrow. The seller was located out of state. The seller did not have a fax machine or email address, so she set up an account at a nearby mail store to receive emails and documents.

Debbie was prepared and set everything up in advance in order to accommodate the seller's needs. On October 3, 2014 a Company–approved mobile signing company met with the seller to notarize her signature on the deed.

The seller signed all of her closing documents and even sent back written instructions to overnight her proceeds check to her home. The file was not scheduled to close until October 10, 2014.

On October 7, 2014 the seller's real estate agent, Sam, began an email exchange with Donna Honberger, Debbie's assistant:

Sam:
Hello Donna,
The Seller wants to know if it is not a problem to have her proceeds paid into an alternative bank account, as she does not want the proceeds to go into her bank account. Let me know if this is a go, she is really wanting it that way.

Donna:
Good morning Sam…we can have the funds wired into an account as long as her name is on the account. If she wants us to wire the funds, she will want to verify with her bank the wiring instructions to send wires to her account. Let me know if I need to call her or if she will be calling us with the information.

Sam:
The alternative account does not have her name on it, she says if it has to have her name then she will have to use her account outside of the United States. So which of the information should she provide? The bank details with a different name or her offshore account.

Donna:
Let me check with accounting, I am working on it….her original instructions were for us to overnight the closing package and proceeds check to her, if she wants it to go into the account that does not have her name on it she may have to stick to her original instructions.

Sam insists:
I am aware of that, but I think she has some other financial commitment complications. That is why she wants the funds in another account or her offshore account.

Donna:
I have not forgotten about this…I need her to fill out wiring instructions. When I receive the buyer's loan documents I will email any requirements from the lender and wiring instructions to her at the email address provided. I will call her first to let her know I am sending it.

Sam emailed the seller to notify her of his efforts. She instructed Sam to email her at an outlook.com account. Sam forwarded her new email address to Donna.

Donna emailed the seller, "The buyer's lender has not yet sent us the documents they want you to sign, do you want me to email them to this address upon receipt? Attached is the Outgoing Wire Instructions you need to complete, sign and return with the loan documents."

The seller responded, "I will be looking for the documents. Yes, please have them sent to this email address."

The loan documents were sent the next day. Debbie was careful to encrypt the email so the seller could reply to the encrypted message since she would be returning her bank account information. She also called the seller to let her know the documents were on the way.

Fifteen minutes later the seller called Debbie looking for the loan documents. She explained she had emailed them to her new email account. The seller told Debbie she did not have a new email address. Debbie knew something was wrong.

Debbie asked the seller if she would verbally provide her with her wiring instructions. The seller was confused. She told Debbie she wanted a check overnighted to her home, just as she indicated in the written instructions sent back on October 3, 2014.

The next day the person who set up the @outlook.com email replied to Debbie:

Morning all,
I found the loan docs in the junk folder of my email after I found it on the upsstore account. Sorry about that. Attached here is the signed copy of the outgoing wire authorization, I had to wait till today because of the time difference. Let me know if there is anything else needed, but my banker assured me that is all that is needed for the funds to hit my account.

The signed wire instructions did match the seller's signature, but the instructions were not dated the same. The date was written in the manner a foreigner typically writes it with the day–month–year. That is now how the seller dated any of her other documents. The account information was for a bank account in Poland and the account name did not match the seller's name.

Debbie reported the incident. She confirmed with her IT department her account had not been hacked. She immediately contacted the real estate agent and seller to let them know one of their accounts might have been hacked, and she would need to communicate with them by phone from now on.

Debbie verbally verified her disbursement instructions with her seller, closed her file and disbursed without any incident or harm to her customers. Thank goodness!