Made a big purchase - haven't been charge 6 weeks on!

lipidicman

So what would happen if you closed the ENTIRE ACCOUNT and moved to a different bank - how would they chase you then?

VH

Interesting idea, closing the account. Although a bit extreme!!

Would you be surprised if I told you it was the wonderful B&Q?

lazy_worker

I made a near £600 purchase this month, but i delayed making it until my new Halifax One card had arrived, and made the purchase on that, as it has 9 months 0% on purchases
Lazy worker

davidcampbell

VH wrote:

Thanks for the stern replies!!! I'm well aware of the moral issues involved in this!

Some of you are implying that I should do nothing and wait around for my card to be charged. Surely not contacting the store and pointing out the mistake is just as morally wrong as stopping the card. Surely it's still evading payment, knowing full well that the store haven't charged you and doing nothing about it!?!?!

in a word, no.

you told them they could take this money of your debit card - you didnt say they had to do it soon. similarly they said they would take this money - they didnt say it would be soon.

they can wait up to 6 months to collect the payment if they wish. they will remember at some point.... not reminding them is not the same as evading payment

I spoke someone at my bank, obviously didn't explain the full details, but they they advised me that if new card is issued and the old one is stopped, it isn't possible to charge anything onto the old card - apparently the card numbers will be different. The company would have to contact me and chase me for the money (they have my phone number which I gave them for devliery). Which is absolutely fine but I certainly won't be telling them about it in the meantime!

your bank are somewhat worringly wrong. yes the card number will change but the transaction will still be debited to your account.

I suspect the debit will trickle through eventually -- I once had a CREDIT card [not a debit card] transaction in Greece come through after about 12 months... Why dontcha stick the 600 quid in a high interest savings a/c to earn a little bit of pocket money until The Reckoning.

only do this if you still have enough in your bank account to cover the £600 if/when it comes out unexpectedly. they dont need to tell you when they are collecting it remember. it has already been authorised so if they call for it and you have moved the funds to savings, you will go overdrawn and your bank will charge you.

nh

I have to say I doubt if they will ever take the money. If there was a problem with the machine and the cashier thought the transaction had gone through, then they think you have paid. I am sure they don't waste their time trying to tally goods bought with money paid. How will this come to light?

I am not saying don't tell them. It is up to the person involved. i hope I would tell them, but then it is much more difficult once you are in the position where maybe you could have an extra £600 in your bank.

If you got a new card, nothing could be charged to the old card, but this £600 transaction already has, in theory, been charged to the card, so if it has gone through and there is just a delay, changing the card will make no difference.

And if it hasn't gone through then they will need your card again surely in order to charge it?

What does it say on your receipt? Maybe it will be clear on there whether it has gone through (if it has the card number on etc.)

VH

Come on, all very well them taking 6 months to debit my card, but it would be really civil of them if they would do it on the day I paid for the item. I moved this £600 out of a savings account across to my regular account specifically to pay by debit card. Now I have £600 sloshing around which I have to remember to leave in my regular account 'just in case' they decide it's time to take the money. If you pay by debit card it's reasonable to expect the card to be charged the same or very next day.

nh wrote:

If you got a new card, nothing could be charged to the old card, but this £600 transaction already has, in theory, been charged to the card, so if it has gone through and there is just a delay, changing the card will make no difference.

And if it hasn't gone through then they will need your card again surely in order to charge it?

Exactly nh - this is what the bank said. If the transaction has not already gone through, i.e. the store haven't already charged, and try to debit again, it won't work. There is no way you can charge against a cancelled card.

As you say, if the charge has gone through and is just delayed, then it will not be possible to stop it.

I checked the receipt and it does indicate that the transaction has gone through. However there were several problems with the swipe machine just before the receipt printed and the store had to ring someone to get it sorted.

Suppose I will just have to wait and see what happens!

jonesMUFCforever

VH wrote:

I've well had the goods, I collected them myself. Strangely enough, the goods weren't in store when I turned up, they had forgotten to send them from the warehouse, so I arranged to pick them up from the warehouse round the corner a few days later. So maybe they are just a sloppy outfit and they've forgotten to charge me...

I suspect it will filter through to the card eventually. Probably just delayed with the messing around with the swipe card machine.

Without knowing which bank you are with this might be difficult to do but next time you are in the bank ask at the counter if there is any 'assigned funds' or words to that effect on your account ie whether the bank system knows if an amount is in the system waiting to hit your account.
Eric

JonSimmonds

#For the shop I work in , all transactions are instantly "approved" so long as there is £££ in the persons bank or CC. out till talks to the banks merchant server that our company uses for approvals/authorisations.

then at the end of the day the till downloads its daily card transactions to head office and then the head office systems will then charge the cards and get the money this process can take up to 2 working days

Got all ths info from my head office serice desk when someone tried to claim we had taken money from her card 3 times in the same day!

Im not sure why your card hasnt been debited, im sure when b+q do the next set of monthly accounts and see a variance they may try toinvestage why and were its come from

BrightonLad

vh, you may still get it charged to your account, but with the technology probably used in the store it is very strange that one transaction should take longer than any other. I had a similar thing happen 2 years ago, in a petrol station in East Grinstead. 6 months later it got charged to my credit card account!

Good for you, though, if it never does get charged, you have done your bit by signing to say debit your account with £600!

Galstonian

There may be some consolidation of electronic records with paper, especially where there is an obvious shortfall. This could take some time to go through, six months doesn't seem too long, if it were the other way around I would expect to be able to get the money if a transaction failed through no fault of my own.