Egg Card - The Most Audacious Scam Ever?

Joe_Bloggs

@Verbatim
I would say that Nationwide are the fastest at handling BACS either in or out. Even Egg's bloated delays are beaten by a transfer between Nationwide and Egg. To some extent Egg are encouraging their customers to hold funds in savings with Egg. This way you can beat their artificial delays.
I would say that Milarky knows a thing or two or three regarding BACS timing and who is the fastest.
J_B.
Edit
Clearly Egg now treat treat debit card payments with contempt. They should be as good as cash.
Some blether from the OFT about the new 1 Day or same day BACS service that never happened.

Milarky

Joe_Bloggs wrote:

I would say that Milarky knows a thing or two or three regarding BACS timing and who is the fastest.

(I won't even respond to that!)

But surely (with apologies to YB and the OP) this is not right?

When you pay money by BACS (on 26th Jan in this case) it leaves your account - there is no question about that. Likewise this money then enters the standard 48 hour cycle. On the morning of Monday 30th it will 'arrive' at Egg's nerve centre (although, being a credit card account, it's actual arrival can't be viewed there for another 24 hours). Is YB seriously saying then that there are things like 'shadow' BACS payments - where your bank actually sends money in your account only to decide to 'retrieve' it later from poor old Egg? A BACS transfer request won't be made by your bank if there are inufficient funds (etc) but then you know where you stand. Once they accept your instruction to withdraw money from your account, however, they are duty bound to forward payment and Egg - and everyone else - knows that the money isn't going to be recalled after it reaches them. In other words the payment must be 'cleared' on receipt because it was clearly made/authorised in the first place. The only possible (and rare) exception to this I can see is when a payment is mistakenly processed by a bank to the wrong recipient (like someone else paying your Egg card - with eggactly the right amount by coincidence!) In that case a 'recall' is a possibility no doubt.

But let's backtrack at that stage. If someone else pays the amount that Egg were expecting, and it arrives a couple of days sooner than yours would have - and you don't make payment, the first thing that you'd say was: "the account was settled on time!" So Egg don't charge you interest (etc). Only that would not happen because Egg never recieved payment from you. This is trying to have it boths ways, however. Egg does receive a sum of money by the 30th - and they even put in on the account with that date. A week passes and no 'recall'. Looks like it was meant to go into that account then, no? Therefore it can't make any difference when Egg 'treats' the payment as non-returnable to the date Egg 'receives' that money. It 'receives' that money when I, you or any other recipient would - after two clear working days.

Reference to '3-4 working days' also needs clarification: Egg says if you make payment to them via debit card instruction - and they must claim the money - it takes 3 working days if requested before an arbitrary cutoff at 2pm and 4 working days if requested after 2pm. But 3 wd (Thur/Fri/Mon) IS 2 'clear' wd (Thur TO Mon). Thus Egg should treat as cleared a DC payment made on Thur 26th By 30th and no later. And since this is referred to in the same breathe as BACS payments (that are made by you instructing your bank and arriving with Egg), Egg are saying, IMO, that BACS payments take no longer than this to be applied to the account.

muffle_2

Milarky - I believe YB is incorrect about the BACS process. Once a BACS payment hits an account it is already cleared. It is also impossible to cancel or retract a BACS payment once it's been received - the very latest is the working day prior to it being received (as taken from the BACS web site). I receive dozens of BACS payments into my bank account every month and it has always gone straight to my cleared balance. Similarly, I pay of all my cards by BACS and never incurred interest except this most recent occassion with Egg due to their new policy. Nor have I ever been advised by any bank that BACS payments take additional time to clear after they have been received.

Please would YB refer to the following URL: http://www.bacs.co.uk/BPSL/directcredit/businesses/faqs/FAQ_public.htm and specifically the following quote: "A. 'Cleared' funds on arrival - Unlike cheques, funds paid by Direct Credit can be used on the day they arrive."

Furthermore, BACS payments have never taken longer than 2 working days after the payment has been sent (eg. if sent Friday, it would be cleared Tuesday, if sent Monday, it would be cleared on Wednesday), in my considerable experience of this system. On occassion I have seen them clear in 1 working day. I beleive Egg are lying in the wording of their policy - to encourage use of DD which THEY control and to gain interest on payments made earlier than necessary.

It's also clear that any attempts to contact Egg with queries will either result in lies or a reply that makes no sense.

Sorry to YorkshireBoy if you feel I'm being stubborn, I do appreciate your attempts to explain but I really feel that your responses are factually incorrect and it is misleading people.

charlie12

Another theory.

Due date is 30th January.
DD (for minimum payment) actioned on 30th January.
BACS payment (for remaining balance) shows up on Egg statement with a date stamp of 30th January.

So the DD is actioned on the due date. As this is the "deadline" date, perhaps Egg's system sets the DD payment as a "deadline", and the DD payment is taken before the BACS payment is credited. Therefore the BACS payment is credited too late (perhaps moments after the DD) and is treated as a "late" payment.

If there was no DD set up at all (not possible with Egg AFAIK), and the BACS payment was for the full balance and arrived on the 30th, then the payment would be accepted as "on time".

Of course it shouldn't be like this but it might be how their systems work.

YorkshireBoy

Hi Muffle & Milarky,

Thanks for taking the time to contribute further to this thread (and thanks for the link to the BACS site - I had visited before but had not noticed Muffle's quote).

I agree that BACS direct credits clear on arrival into current accounts. Like Muffles experience, any that land in my account (after the normal 2-3 day transit) immediately go towards my available balance and can be drawn on straight away (Indeed, I have moved money on at 5 minutes past midnight on the day of 'landing' on the odd occasion). However, maybe the answer to the problem lies in whether the institution is a 'clearing bank'?

For example, why else would ING et al restrict access to your own money for 3 days? Therefore, I believe my logic (I have no insider knowledge) holds up in that because Egg are not a clearing bank, they apply a 3 day 'wait'. Otherwise, why else would they ask you to allow 7 working days when NatWest, Lloyds, et al ask you to allow 4 days?

Only last week I initiated a transfer from my own bank current account at 00:30 on Wednesday which 'arrived' in my LloydsTSB credit card account at 01:00 on Friday (48 hours!). I'll never know if it actually 'cleared' on that day because I was still 2 weeks away from the payment due date.

It is a pity that we can't get a definitive answer from Egg.

We do have some 'bankers' on the board though (M Thomson & ejones to name but two - I think?). It would be nice to get a response from these guys.

muffle_2

YB, thanks for your reply.

I don't think that is the case, because I have been paying off my Egg Card and Egg Money card this way for over 2 years, and have never incurred interest. Surely they would have done this before now.

I have heard the excuse of them not being a clearing bank when I've spoken to them over the phone in the past. They seemed surprised that BACS payments had been received by me in 2 working days. Perhaps transfers from other banks than Bank of Scotland do take longer, but I have no way of knowing that.

I am inclined to believe the explanation is that any BACS payment does not count towards the interest calculation of a current statement, as they said in the secure message and 2 people including the supervisor said on the phone. The only way to pay it off now is with DD.

YorkshireBoy

muffle wrote:

...I have been paying off my Egg Card and Egg Money card this way for over 2 years, and have never incurred interest. Surely they would have done this before now.

Ah, but herein lies the problem. Egg have only recently made some changes (to both debit card and BACS timescales) and this is what may have caught you out.

muffle_2

charlie12 wrote:

Another theory.

Due date is 30th January.
DD (for minimum payment) actioned on 30th January.
BACS payment (for remaining balance) shows up on Egg statement with a date stamp of 30th January.

So the DD is actioned on the due date. As this is the "deadline" date, perhaps Egg's system sets the DD payment as a "deadline", and the DD payment is taken before the BACS payment is credited. Therefore the BACS payment is credited too late (perhaps moments after the DD) and is treated as a "late" payment.

If there was no DD set up at all (not possible with Egg AFAIK), and the BACS payment was for the full balance and arrived on the 30th, then the payment would be accepted as "on time".

Of course it shouldn't be like this but it might be how their systems work.

A good theory but I don't think it works on a per-second basis. All the banks I've dealt with have operated on a working day basis up to 6pm.

For example, a payment due to be cleared on Monday will show up as cleared after 6PM on Friday, with a date of Monday on the statement. Any subsequent moving of the money can be done instantly but again all actions will be dated Monday on the statement.

The same goes for Direct Debits, they will show up as debited after 6PM the working day prior to it being debited. So obviously the 'target' banks know at least a day in advance about DD and BACS transactions.

But I don't think in this case it would have mattered whether it was paid on the due date or 2 weeks before.

Joe_Bloggs

If Egg or any other financial institution think that they can get away with ignoring payments and increasing transaction delays what hope is there for the OFT chaired Payment Systems Taskforce talking shop ?
Treasury legislation may be the way to go to speed things up from the delays that belonged in the 19th Century.
J_B. (For rapid payment 'old style' use a tally stick and a long bow.)

moneyfool

Well I was thinking of an Egg card ,but now I'm not !!seems like its only the CUSTOMERS who get egg on their faces.....
I'm no fool