A Belfast teenager just became an overnight millionaire but only noticed when he went to check his account for a small deposit from his Granny.
Dane Gillespie is maybe just the luckiest boy in Belfast right now.
The 18-year-old was waiting on a cheque from his grandma for £8,900 – a princely sum not to be sniffed at – to clear and was eagerly checking his online banking balance on his phone when he was met with a rather nice surprise.
The 18-year-old was the happy recipient of £8.9million – for a few hours at least.
His mum, Caroline, told Belfast Live:
My son thought he was a millionaire for a few hours. There was £8.9 million in his account on Wednesday morning. It’s as well he told us and didn’t go and blow it all. He’s only 18.
He got a cheque from his grandmother for £8,900 and put the cheque in last Thursday. I said to him this morning, ‘that cheque should be cleared in your savings’ and he went, ‘right’.
It’s hardly the life story of Bill Gates, but luckily the young lad listened to his mum and went to check on the cheque’s progress.
Well, Dane saw figures on his phone most of us couldn’t even quantify if we tried: £8,900,000, to be exact.
But I’m going to try.
Had Dane accrued the money through legitimate means, he could now be the proud owner of some prime real estate; a seven-bed apartment in South Kensington, London, for example.
He could buy a couple of yachts… Maybe 2,225,000 Freddo chocolates. Dane, on the other hand, immediately started dreaming of supercars, his mum said.
He could’ve bought about 114 Porsche 911s worth £78,000, according to some number crunching Google helped complete.
Let’s be honest, it’s more zeros than most of us will earn over the course of 12 lifetimes.
Caroline said her and husband couldn’t believe their eyes, adding:
Next minute my husband messaged me with the photograph of his bank account details. It took me a wee while to click.
He’s going to me, ‘I’m gonna order a Porsche’ and I said, ‘Don’t be daft, that’s not our money, we need to get this sorted’.
It was like that for a good few hours. For an 18-year-old being a millionaire for the day, he just can’t believe it. He just wanted to go out and spend, but if you do then you have to pay it back.
He thought all his birthdays came at once this morning. It’s mad.
A spokeswoman for Nationwide told MailOnline Dane would not have been able to spend all the mistakenly added money, adding:
The customer paid the cheque in at the branch and unfortunately the wrong amount was keyed. The error was noticed straight away and the balance was corrected in a matter of seconds.
While the amount was shown on his balance, cheques do not clear straight away, so the funds were never in is account. Sadly he may have to wait a little longer to buy the Porsche he wants.
Caroline said the mistake was made by a Nationwide in the city centre at Donegall Place. BRB, just going to go and change my bank to a Nationwide on Belfast high street.
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A former emo kid who talks too much about 8Chan meme culture, the Kardashian Klan, and how her smartphone is probably killing her. Francesca is a Cardiff University Journalism Masters grad who has done words for BBC, ELLE, The Debrief, DAZED, an art magazine you’ve never heard of and a feminist zine which never went to print.