Companies helping themselves to money in my account

chris_dale17

Can anyone tell me if it's legal for a company to just take money out of my account without any authorisation from me?

This is what happened. I hired a van and had to pay £250 deposit which would be returned to me automatically 7 days after the vehicle had been returned. 7 days passed and no money so I complained and then 2 days later they paid £500 into my account; obviously they did this in error. I was expecting a letter or phone call from them asking for it back but was surprised and very annoyed to find that 2 weeks later they just took it; how can they do this?
No contact with me, just helped themselves. Surely this is not allowed, what's to stop them from just helping themselves again?

Any advice on the matter would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Chris

ormus

when you signed the hire agreement, the payment terms would be agreed.
that would include taking payments direct.
you still have control though as you can reverse any payments from/to your bank, if there is any dispute.

rustybucket

So you called them after 2 days to after they promised to refund your money and they put £500 back? Why didn't you call them after 2 days and inform them of their mistake?

By rights that money belongs to them and while they have made a mistake you should have let them know rather than them finding out 2 weeks later that they were £250 down.

The fact is that you had authorised them when you took out the hire agreement so I can't see any problem on their part and I can't for the life of me see why you're annoyed.

chris_dale17

Obviously the £250 was theirs and I had no problem in them having it back, I was annoyed at the fact that they could just take it from my current acct without even contacting me to authorise it. Surely whilst it's in my account it belongs to me, I wouldnt' be able to just help myself to money in your account, legally anyway; so why can they?
I'm not after anything from them, just thought it was wrong of them.

fitshase

It could have been a bank error. They could have instructed the return of your £250 and the bank put it through twice by mistake. In that case, they complain to the bank, the bank applies to your bank for a refund and your bank refunds it.

If you believe it was an error then you apply to your bank for the money back. However, if it was me I would have contacted the company straight away to notify them of any error in payments.