NatWest Currency Charge with Air France

mr.omneo

I'm a new forum poster so forgive me if I post this in the wrong place I thought my experience might be informative to some of the forums visitors .

Last week I booked a flight with Air France via airfrance.co.uk for £172.15 and when checking my statement online I noticed I was charged £173.40, the entry showed the £172.15 with an extra 'charge' of £1.25. Now, i paid with Maestro which didn't attract a surcharge, credit cards had an extra £4 added. Quite miffed by this I emailed Air France and asked them to justify the charge or refund it.

Air France replied via email that i should telephone them, which I duly did and a customer service rep advised me that they received many calls regarding the charge and that it was in fact a booking fee which for some reason should be detailed on the website but wasn't, they were very sorry blah blah blah...

I still wasn't too happy with the explanation so fired off another email and received a call yesterday from Air France who advised me that they no longer charged a booking fee so the £1.25 wasn't from them, however she thought that it might be a glitch and the system had charged me in error so requested I get a copy of my statement.

After being passed to no less that 5 departments it transpires that the charge was levied by my bank as a fee for processing a foreign currency transaction. It would appear that whilst I made and paid for the booking via airfrance.co.uk, the payment is processed as being requested by airfrance.fr which triggers the foreign currency charge. So, even though Air France requests the sum in Sterling, because it is appears as if a non-UK based entity is requesting the money, the bank levy a fee for converting Sterling to Sterling!

So while Air France is not making extra millions by slipping in a hidden £1.25 to each ticket bought, it would appear they are indirectly swelling the accounts of NatWest and no doubt the rest of the RBS Group!
Quite cheeky if you ask me!

Incapuppy

Was 2 emails and a phone call worth it to find out why you had been charged an extra £1.25? ;0)

mr.omneo

Incapuppy wrote: »

Was 2 emails and a phone call worth it to find out why you had been charged an extra £1.25? ;0)

Sadly I can be like a dog with a bone... because no one could explain the charge I was more determined to find out what it was.

knightstyle

YES always look after the pennies!

meester

mr.omneo wrote: »

I'm a new forum poster so forgive me if I post this in the wrong place I thought my experience might be informative to some of the forums visitors .

Well it clearly has nothing to do with Air France! It's just Natwest ripping you off as per their published terms.

mr.omneo

meester wrote: »

Well it clearly has nothing to do with Air France! It's just Natwest ripping you off as per their published terms.

Well, as i said, indirectly Air France are helping NatWest. I don't expect booking a flight with AirFrance.co.uk to be treated as a foreign currency transaction as I see a price in sterling, on a 'UK' website. It's the fact that Air France process the internet payment via their French website that attracts the charge i.e. a currency charge to convert £172.15 to... £172.15.

It just makes me wonder how many £1.25's Nat West get for doing nothing.

meester

mr.omneo wrote: »

Well, as i said, indirectly Air France are helping NatWest. I don't expect booking a flight with AirFrance.co.uk to be treated as a foreign currency transaction as I see a price in sterling, on a 'UK' website. It's the fact that Air France process the internet payment via their French website that attracts the charge i.e. a currency charge to convert £172.15 to... £172.15.

Um, no. If I buy something from Air France I expect it to be processed in France. Most normal decent banks won't charge, and if Air France had to acquire a separate processing faciity in England they'd probably have to charge you an extra £1.25 themselves to cover the costs.

It has not been done as a foreign currency transaction, nor has £172.15 been converted to anything. Rather, Natwest has levied a £1.25 overseas transaction charge for the transaction taking place overseas.

It just makes me wonder how many £1.25's Nat West get for doing nothing.

Well a lot obviously.

Simon1981

meester wrote: »

Um, no. If I buy something from Air France I expect it to be processed in France.

Not really - there are plenty of foreign companies which have UK-based businesses. E.g. If you dealt with Abbey you wouldnt expect transactions to be processed in Spain because it is in fact part of Santander. As the OP pointed out he undertook the transaction at a .co.uk address - not unreasonable to assume he was dealing with a UK-based transaction.

And if it just the name that is luring your expectations - what about companies such as Canadian Affair? - you wouldn't expect it to be processed in CAN$ would you?

meester

Simon1981 wrote: »

Not really - there are plenty of foreign companies which have UK-based businesses. E.g. If you dealt with Abbey you wouldnt expect transactions to be processed in Spain because it is in fact part of Santander. As the OP pointed out he undertook the transaction at a .co.uk address - not unreasonable to assume he was dealing with a UK-based transaction.

Well no, Abbey are a UK business that happen to have been taken over by a Spanish bank.

And if it just the name that is luring your expectations - what about companies such as Canadian Affair? - you wouldn't expect it to be processed in CAN$ would you?

If I buy tickets from the French national carrier, I would not expect the transaction to be processed in the UK.

Simon1981

meester wrote: »

Well no, Abbey are a UK business that happen to have been taken over by a Spanish bank.

Perhaps not such a good example - take GE then - a multinational company. You would not expect a transaction undertaken with GE in the UK to be processed in US$. My point being that the original provenance of a company's name or original incarnation is not necessarily an indicator that you are not dealing with a UK business. Hence, which was the point of my point, - it is not unreasonable - even if you take issue with his assumption - for the OP to consider he was undertaking a UK transaction through a .co.uk address.

meester wrote: »

If I buy tickets from the French national carrier, I would not expect the transaction to be processed in the UK.

The point here was solely ("if it just the name that is luring your expectations") against your sarcastically enlarged "France" as if the country appearing in a company's name were an indicator of the where the transaction would be completed.