Double charged by Tesco

UnderPressure

stebiz wrote: »

I rang the bank, and they said that some of Tesco's terminals are way out of date, and that they only work if overridden by the staff, and no pin put in.

Steve

Considering how money grabbing Tesco are I find this quite hard to believe as being correct, I am 100% sure that if Tesco had a problem with their terminals that was stopping them from swiping transactions not only would they know about it but you could bet your bottom dollar it would be sorted and and extremely quickly.

However I cannot think of another explanation so who knows......................

lyndseyb_3

UPDATE

Well it's been nearly a week now and the money has not been credited back to my account, Co-op are blaming Tesco and Tesco are blaming Co-op. Co-op customer services have said they used to have this problem a lot with Asda but it seems to have settled, so there may be some truth in the problem with the particualr type of card I have (it's actually a Visa Debit, not Electron - I forgot it had been updated. Still doesn't work in the pay at pump machines, on the trainline.com or the Cineworld website though).

The response from the Chief Exc's office was:

Dear Mrs Brannen
>
> Thank you for your email addressed to Sir Terry Leahy, our Chief Executive, to which I have been asked to reply.
>
> I was very sorry to learn of your recent experience in our Wolverton store, when your card was declined, and that it resulted in you having to change plans you had made for your wedding anniversary. I can appreciate the disappointment this caused.
>
> I fully understand that this unfortunate situation was no fault of your own, so I sincerely apologise for the subsequent upset and inconvenience it caused. It is impossible to say why the transaction would have been declined, as the retailer does not make that decision, so I am sorry that you believe this to be the result of an error of ours. The authorisation process is fully automated, and there is every chance that your card could have been declined simply due to the process taking too long at a particularly busy time. I am sorry that we cannot offer any more information on this.
>
> With regard to the problem you experienced with funds being reserved from your bank account, this is something that can happen for a number of reasons. When a customer enters their PIN, the transaction is presented to the bank for payment at that exact moment. If there is a problem with processing the transaction, perhaps if it is cancelled before the authorisation is complete, or the card is removed, there is a chance that it may appear as though the money has already been taken. Unfortunately, this can also happen if the transaction appears to have been declined.
>
> In fact, the funds are not removed, but the card issuing bank may reserve them until it is clear that they are not actually being requested. Depending on the bank you are with, the process for clearing funds back to an account can take a few days unfortunately.
>
> It would not be correct or appropriate for our staff, or your bank, to place blame with each other for this happening. This is a software issue, and is not something that can be controlled by either the retailer or the bank, and we are not actually aware of it until a customer brings it to our attention.
>
> With that in mind, even if you had withdrawn the cash from the machine, as opposed to using your card in store again, the original amount of £90.11 would still have been showing as reserved, so there was no way for this to have been avoided. However, your bank could have informed you to return to store and ask for a copy of the cancelled transaction to be faxed to them, allowing the reserved funds to be released to you immediately. This is the only way that we can assist with this process, so it is disappointing that you were not told to this.
>
> Please accept my assurances that I do sympathise with your position, and I am very sorry that this resulted in you having to change your plans. However, I hope that the above information has helped to better explain the process, and that you can now appreciate that this was an unfortunate series of events, but that there was nothing we could have done to prevent this happening.
>
> Thank you for taking the time to bring this to our attention.
>
>
> Kind Regards
>
>
> Paul Milligan
> Customer Service Executive

I have replied to this with the suggestion that it may well be a problem with my card and Tesco's payment system and that they are penalising their poorer customers.
On the plus side, I called customer services to ask for the money to be credited back as the Co-op said that Tesco always claim it will be done automatically but it never is until they actually do something. Having got a bit upset and teary, I was passed to a team leader who is sending me a £30 voucher as compensation which is something.

Thanks so much for taking the time to reply to my question, I appreciate it. I just hope it never happens again!