Expedia will stop you from using your bank account

ffs

What follows happened to my gf:

She booked a flight costing £600 using her debit card. A week later she found she had no access to funds she believed were in her bank account. Luckily she was in the UK and had her travelcard so she was able to get home from work, but she had no access to money at all. Thinking she was the victim of fraud or theft she called her bank who informed her that not only had a charge of £600 been deducted from her card for the flight, but at the same time a second amount of approx £610 had been 'reserved' by Expedia.

On calling Expedia she was told that she would need to get an authorisation code from her bank so that the 'reserved' amount could be 'reversed'. She did so and called them back with this code. Expedia then told her that it could take up to a week for this 'reversal' to take effect.

In fact it took approximately 48 hours. However during this time she had no access to any funds whatsoever. If she had been abroad, a fairly likely scenario bearing in mind that she had bought a flight, she could have been stranded with no access to any money, no way of contacting anyone, no way of paying for travel or accommodation and found herself in a potentially life threatening situation.

We sent Expedia a formal complaint, who acknowledged what had happened, and even the potential implications, but denied any error and refused to say that would not happen in future. Instead they described it as frustrating, and as a token of goodwill offered a £25 voucher off future travel.

I feel this is an insult. Expedia prevented my gf from accessing £600 worth of funds in her account for about ten days, and then denied any error.

If I sold Expedia a service, and then prevented them from using their banking facilites for ten days, I doubt they would consider it frustrating.

I intend to refer this to the Trading Standards Authority, and would welcome advice from anyone who has successfully persued this course of action.

mexicanwaver

Sounds like a nightmare mate!

Did Excrement say why this extra 'reserved' amount occurs in the first place?

smallblueplanet

I've seen this happen on my credit card account. Keeping an eye on the transactions online because I was close to my limit, I saw that 'available credit' had dropped to a minus figure. I rang them up and said I am not up to my credit limit but with a minus available balance how can I use my credit card?

They calmly told me I couldn't, but they'd try and get the 'largish' transaction that had been debited once but was also holding the same amount in reserve from my available credit reversed! They only said this after me hassling them of course - think it took a couple of days even so.

I was furious, I could picture the problems this would have caused if I'd been out shopping, as I've only the one credit card and no cash, but the cc company were very blase about it! So its not just debit cards it happens to (and I think the payment was for my car insurance from Tesco's).

in_my_wellies

Sorry, but what is a 'reserve' for?

SuiDreams

I've had the same problem with my Yorkshire Building society Card, but this time it was there fault. Aparently When a company makes a charge on your account they reserve the money 1st then calim it off the Bank. In my Case the amount had been Reserved and then Claimed, but when Y B S had paid the money they had not taken the reservation off, so I couldn't use my card at all took me 3 days on the phone to sort it.

lisyloo

Sorry, but what is a 'reserve' for?

When you buy something the company reserve the money immiediate because it takes a few days for payments to go through.

What SHOULD happen is that the reservation should be removed when they take the money.

Occassionally the reserve is still left on there for some reason.
We have had a credit card declined for this reason.
Fortunately it was only the embarassement that was the problem rather than anything more major.

LesD

That sounds more like it. The problem is between Expedia and the bank. One or other is responsible and should meet any costs in putting it right including compensation.

If they don't, sounds like a good case for the ombudsman.

The other moral of this story is never put all your coins in one piggy-bank!!!

michaels

I know car hire companies sometimes put a 'hold' on an amount to cover any excess which can be a pain when on holiday but I can't see why this would happen with a purchase?

lisyloo

but I can't see why this would happen with a purchase?

Well I can assure you it does.

I would advise having 2 cards.
I usually take a mastercard and a VISA (and a debit card), although I don't think I've ever found anywhere that doesn't take both.

I don't take any more than that because there are risks of pick pockets etc. so it is a trade off.

ffs

It would seem to me that the process of removing the "reserved" charge should be automatic. Perhaps the reason this process failed was the in this case the reserve was for a slightly larger amount that was eventually claimed.

I am still at a loss as to why Expedia would not accept that they had made an error, and were also unwilling to say it wouldn't happen in the future.

student100

I recently had the same thing happen with Amercian Airlines. They pre-authorised an amount slightly more than the actual costs of the flights I was booking, but for some reason charged the actual flights as a second transaction rather than the conclusion of the first pre-authorised amount.

The "reserved" amount will eventually remove itself automatically after 7-10 days or so.

Helpfully Nationwide agreed to increase my credit limit to allow me to use the card while this transaction was still there.