Alliance & Leicester, AGAIN! and Missing amounts

climbintheladderouttadebt

Morning all!

I check my Internet banking daily and over the last few months I have noticed at times £1-£10 'missing' from my account, only to be returned a day or 2 later. These are not transactions, my money just seems to be witheld from me.

I have started making a list of the dates and missing amounts. It reads as follows:

10 June 2010
Balance £102.28
Available balance £101.28
£1 difference

22 June 2010
Balance £120.40
Available balance £119.40
£1 difference

25 June 2010
Balance £186.17
Available balance £185.17
£1 difference

01 July 2010
Balance £86.90
Available balance £49.90
Running Balance £51.90
£2 difference between available & running balance not accounted for, & missing since 30 June (the difference between balance & the other 2 is expected due to a pending transaction that wen through fine)

05 July 2010
Balance £89.57
Available balance £87.57
£2 difference (this has been the case since 30 June, so it has been 5 days, and the £2 is nowhere to be seen!)

Have any other A&L customers noticed this? Obviously I want to query this with A&L but would really like to have gathered more info from others first in case they are allowed to do this under something in the t&cs I may have missed...

Many thanks for any replies!

csnann

Did you order anything over the internet around these dates? Apparently, when the shop verifies your credit or debit card it makes small charge (£1 or £2) to make sure the card is active. This is then paid back when the order is filled and the real charge made. I have noticed this happening when I order a Tesco delivery.

climbintheladderouttadebt

Hi csnann, thanks for that info, I shall bear it in mind.

I don't often shop online as such. I tried a Tesco shop last week but it was unsuccessful as my standing order set up for 31st came out on 30th as there weren't 31 days in June and left me a few quid short of the amount needed for the shopping (not the SO and I have incurred no charges). I have ordered nothing since so will keep up the record and I shall look out for any correspondence between missing amounts and any orders I may place for anything online.

Usually I just shop in local stores with my card. The shops wouldn't make the small charges would they?

DizzleUK

Yeah this is not something that is unique to A&L. When cards are verified when trying to make a payment or registering for something a small authorisation is made, usually for £1 and is returned anything up to a week later.

Some shops have floor limits and will just check the card is valid before charging the full amount. I know Tesco's Pay&Pump works like this. You put your card in, it verifies it with a £1 amount, you then fill up and that amount is applied to your card a couple of days later.

Also, something else that is really annoying is when you pay for something in a shop (usually happens in my local Chinese restaurant) when something goes wrong with the payment and it gets put through again, you end up with a duplicate amount being withheld from your balance in the same way as above for a few days.

As most people use all their money in their bank accounts each month with nothing to spare days before payday it can get a little inconvenient. At the moment I am cramming in as much overtime as possible so that I can attempt to keep a running balance of £100 minimum at all times to cushion myself against these minor troubles. (I expect it will be gone again come Christmas lol).

climbintheladderouttadebt

DizzleUK wrote: »

Yeah this is not something that is unique to A&L. When cards are verified when trying to make a payment or registering for something a small authorisation is made, usually for £1 and is returned anything up to a week later.

Some shops have floor limits and will just check the card is valid before charging the full amount. I know Tesco's Pay&Pump works like this. You put your card in, it verifies it with a £1 amount, you then fill up and that amount is applied to your card a couple of days later.

Also, something else that is really annoying is when you pay for something in a shop (usually happens in my local Chinese restaurant) when something goes wrong with the payment and it gets put through again, you end up with a duplicate amount being withheld from your balance in the same way as above for a few days.

As most people use all their money in their bank accounts each month with nothing to spare days before payday it can get a little inconvenient. At the moment I am cramming in as much overtime as possible so that I can attempt to keep a running balance of £100 minimum at all times to cushion myself against these minor troubles. (I expect it will be gone again come Christmas lol).

I'm the same, I try extremely hard to leave min. £100 in the account as safety. 12 months ago Lloyds TSB tried to process my credit card payment 3 times. They cleared my account so thank God I had my own 'buffer' to prevent too many fees!

The £2 is still missing today, it's technically 7 days at least that it has not been there for. If it is because of my Tesco shopping, which I never got anyway, I shall have a good rethink about how I pay for all my shopping.

I never signed up for money to be taken from my account, I may call A&L today, see if they can find it, and then start making some complaints. I struggle immensely with my finances because of my problems with numbers and I don't need anyone making it worse when they take money without my consent. If I was informed, I'd budget for it. I'm not, therefore I can't. Sickening tbh!

Thanks for the info guys!