egg won't repay fraud

elennor

My son had a nil balance on his Egg card but when the statement came through he found he had been a victim of fraud. He informed Egg who cancelled the card but now Egg will not repay him. As my son was worried he would get a bad credit rating if he didn’t pay and he is looking to get a flat soon, he paid the outstanding balance bu he cannot afford to lose this money.
Egg sent him a letter saying:
I've fully investigated your disputed transactions. As members of specific card schemes banks are limited in their right to dispute transactions with a retailer by specific rules and regulations. Outside of these regulations any refund offered by Egg is based upon the individual circumstances of each case. We've fully evaluated your case based upon the information available and regret to inform you in this instance we're unable to assist you in your claim against the retailer. In this instance we have been able to link the transaction to subscription to adult entertainment websites. These were subscribed to using your e-mail address (***********.com). These subscriptions were for https://www.allsmutlovers.com (started as a $1 2 day trial) and https://www.megadvdpass.com (started as a $1 3 day trial). They are both now showing as 'webmaster cancelled'. Regards Gregory CrooksDispute Resolution Unit
OPENING BALANCE £0.00
16 Apr 2010 MUHPOP.COM 8669497664 KN £30.24 DR 45.17 USD @ 1.4937169310
18 Apr 2010 PAY-MNT.COM877-706-3790 NICOSIA CY £33.51 DR 49.87 USD @ 1.4882124740
25 Apr 2010 WEBFILESUPPORT.COM 441865980279 KN £2.45 DR 3.64 USD @ 1.4857142860
28 Apr 2010 PAYMENT 2 EGG . GB £5.00 CR 09 May 2010

He has looked up the sites and others are having the same problem. They are obviously dodgy sites and all in American dollars. He has never used any of them. The email address they say is linked is my sons but his is .co.uk whereas the letter says .com although this could just be a typo at Eggs end.

I cannot see how they have the right to do this. How can he claim this money back? It is over half his wages.

Please help. Thank you

magpiecottage

Unfortunate name for a person dealing with fraud investigations!

Actually, FSA rule BCOBS 5.1.11 says, "
(1) 2Where a banking customer denies having authorised a payment, it is for the firm to prove that the payment was authorised.
(2) Where a payment from a banking customer's account was not authorised by the banking customer, a firm must, within a reasonable period, refund the amount of the unauthorised payment to the banking customer and, where applicable, restore the banking customer's account to the state it would have been in had the unauthorised payment not taken place."
The links are to FSA definitions. The actual page of the FSA website where it is recorded is here.

Remind them of this and ask them to reimburse within one working day or refer it to their complaints procedure.

elennor

Ha, I didn't even notice his name but at least it made me laugh. Thank you so much for the advice. My son has emailed them back quoting the FSA as you suggested so fingers crossed. How long do we wait and what is the next step please. These people make me so cross, it is such a small amount to them but such a big thing for him as he has a bill for his car for £170 which he cannot pay because of this.
Thank you again for your help.

elennor

Well, I got a reply today which was far from helpful-anyone got any ideas of what I can do now?

Dear

I'm sorry to hear you feel this way.

I can see our Disputes team have investigated this for you and I apologise for the typing error for the email address we provided you with.

The email address we hold for you is '************@hotmail.co.uk'.

Our records show that the transaction was processed thoough your email address and as it is linked to adult entertainement we're unable to proceed with this case.

If you'd like to make a complaint you'll need to put this in writign to:-

Customer Relations Team
Egg
Pride Park
Riverside Road
Derby
DE99 3GG

As my colleague stated in the previous message that as members of specific card schemes banks are limited in their right to dispute transactions with a retailer by specific rules and regulations. Outside of these regulations any refund offered by Egg is based upon the individual circumstances of each case.

Thanks for your message.

Regards

Rehana Khalid
Internet Customer Services.