Charged twice for shopping in supermarket

Mel2

I went to Tesco on Friday evening and bought my grocery shopping spending £56. I had £50 cash in my purse so asked if I could pay that then pay the remaining £6 on my debit card. All fine and went home happy.
Then yesterday I checked my bank statement on online banking and noticed that the payment for £6 had been debited but also a payment for £56, both by Tesco. I telephoned my bank to double check that this was correct and they confirmed that I had been charged twice for my shopping and advised me to contact the store.
On speaking to the store manager he apologised and said that this is what's known as a 'ghost transaction' and that my money is floating around in the ether and when it's not requested by Tesco it will find it's way back to my bank account but this might take up to 10 days!!!! I called my bank again and they said that there is nothing they can do to speed this process up and that I will just have to wait.
Money is very tight at the moment and this error on their part has left me with no money at all until payday on Friday! To say I'm not happy is an understatement.
Surely I have a right to get my money back immediately? I mentioned compensation to the manager for the stress of this and the inconvenience it's called but got nowhere!!!!

Forwandert

They can't give you a refund as they haven't got your money, there is nothing you can do but wait for it to come back through the system, they can't accept your ghost payment and give you the money as there isn't an actual transaction it links to.

MrandMrsB

Why does Tesco make so many mistakes? I hate shopping there, but until Waitrose open here, we have no choice.

They usually double charge or charge full price for items that are on offer.

Of course you are entitled to an immediate refund. Our 24-hour store didn't used to compensate for mistakes that they made after 10pm, instead they told customers to sort it out next time (after the evidence has been eaten)!!

Forwandert

It's not just Tesco, this is a problem that can happen with any transaction in any store, i've always understood it to be a problem with the company that authorises the transactions due to it being a problem in all retailers.

There's also nothing to refund, they haven't got the money, it's inbetween the bank and the Tesco at the minute, when you pay for something with a debit card the money doesn't go instantly into Tesco's account it can take days, same as when you ask for a refund to a debit card and it takes days to go back into your account.

McKneff

Go to the Tesco website. Go to the 'Contact us' section.

I did this yesterday about an overcharge and I kid you not, within 3 minutes of me hitting the 'send' button they were on the phone to me, resolved the problem, gave me a double refund,

Excellent service. Give it a try and let us know how you get on.

alistair.long

a similar thing like this happened with me, however I used my credit card. It seemed that I payed somebody £200 so had to wait for it to clear. It never cleared and never went out.

If tesco had taken the money out, then you are intitled to a refund, and if you go overdrawn then you can write a letter and tell them to pay for the charges as a result of their overcharging.

I would in the meantime printscreen your account page.

pmduk

Most banks don't take the full 10 days to lose these transactions. For example RBS group takes 2-3 working days.

meer53

It's not an actual transaction, it's an authorisation. It will drop off the system in the next few days. There isn't anything to refund as it hasn't debited. Every retailer does this, some drop off faster than others, most of the time you don't even know it's happened. No good complaining to Tesco, they won't be able to do anything for you, they haven't done anything wrong.