First painful lesson... but open to learn
I'm trying to understand whether this is simply standard practice across the crypto industry or whether it's something that deserves more discussion.
Suppose someone mistakenly sends an ERC-20 token to an exchange deposit address that was intended only for ETH. The blockchain transaction completes successfully, and on-chain evidence shows the assets were delivered to an address generated by the exchange.
The exchange's response is that they have no recovery process (or that recovery is not supported), even though the assets appear to be sitting at an address under the exchange's control.
I fully understand that the user made the mistake. That's not the issue.
My question is what happens to those assets afterward.
- Are they technically unrecoverable, or is this primarily a business policy?
- If the exchange controls the destination address, what ultimately happens to unsupported tokens that accumulate there?
- Are there accounting, custody, or regulatory obligations regarding customer assets that end up in this situation?
- Have any exchanges introduced recovery procedures or fees for these cases?
I'm not trying to accuse any particular company of wrongdoing. I'm genuinely trying to understand where the line is between a technical limitation and a business decision.
I'd especially appreciate hearing from people who work in exchange operations, custody, or blockchain infrastructure.