Bizarre Situation with Debit Card, Advice Needed

CannotFindHelp

So my girlfriend purchases a fair bit of stuff using her debit card, as opposed to carrying or using cash, which is becoming more and more the norm I guess. Anyway the other day she phoned her bank when she noticed a payment hadn't been claimed for an item in well over four weeks. Not knowing where the item could have come from she suspected fraud and told her bank the same.

They sent her a form to make a claim against a suspect payment and also released the funds that evening into her account from the payment in question. She was told it could have been from company X, who she had never heard of, and when she searched for it online she found nothing, which prompted her to suspect fraud in the first place.

After a few days and a little more internet savy, I managed to find a link between the company accepting payment and the managing director of a popular high street retailer. Having shopped with them before many many times and recently through both their on-line and high street representation, I was surprised a payment to them would come up like this. Furthermore, it took a bit of investigation to make this link, and it wasn't easy to find.

So, now that we know that the payment they took from her when she agreed to pay was taken and yet not claimed so returned, can this company now come back and demand this payment again? I would imagine having had several weeks to take the funds, and not having done so, they have relinquished all claim to their request for payment and through some loophole the services/product have been received for free.

[Deleted User]

No. They have some months, if not years to claim payment.

onlypaddy

You're wrong I'm afraid.

If she paid for something with her debit card, it will generate an authorisation number at the point of sale. Usually this will take the amount off the 'Available Balance' of the account, and the money actually goes out a couple of days later, when the retailer claims it.

Sometimes the system doesnt work and the available balance is reset (this varies from bank to bank, anything between 5 -7 days). However the authorisation number generated at point of sale is valid for 6 months, and the retailer can claim their money with no prior warning at any time in the 6 month window.

After this, the authorisation expires but they still have up to 6 years from the sale date to formally request payment from the bank, using a new authorisation.

Nothing in life is free!

moonrakerz

CannotFindHelp wrote: »

my girlfriend purchases a fair bit of stuff using her debit card, as opposed to carrying or using cash, which is becoming more and more the norm I guess.

I would suggest that she considers getting a credit card (if she doesn't have one) rather than using her debit card so much.

1. She will get additional consumer protection. Sect 75 of the CCA.
2. Any fraud on her debit card is HER money, fraud on a credit card is the bank's money.
3. If she doesn't like the idea of running up a bill for the end of the month on a credit card: Buy the item on the credit card, then as soon as she gets home she does a transfer from her current account to the credit card account and pays the item off.