HSBC Account balance doesn't match spending

jcarey5225

I have just set up a new debit card and put 20 pounds into the account, to get it started. Since then I have bought a £10 topup for my phone and transferred £5 into my savings account. That is all. However, when I bought the top up, I had to set up visa verified (twice, failed the first time) and my available balance went down to £8! The account balance still read £20 (just a pending transaction) When I transferred the £5 to my savings account, my account balance dropped to £15, which was completely expected, but now my available balance is £1.42!
My questions are these:

1. Do Visa Verified charge to set up the service? (if so, what is this charge? - I've assumed there is a £1 charge to set it up)
2. Where has the other £1.58 gone from the £3 that should be left?

GlamGirlie

Verified by Visa do not charge.

Was the £20 you put in cash? If it was a cheque it would take 4 working days to clear and if you drew on it earlier than the 4th day you may have been charged some debit interest.

Ring them and ask.

Mikeyorks

jcarey5225 wrote: »

Do Visa Verified charge to set up the service?

No. But - often 3rd party software is used and they check the validity of the card by hitting it with a smallish value ...... which will drop off after a few days. It's been a while - but from memory Halifax are £2.50 - but their T&Cs studiously refrain from telling you that will happen

GlamGirlie

But that is Halifax's charge - Verified by Visa themselves do not charge.

Mikeyorks

GlamGirlie wrote: »

But that is Halifax's charge - Verified by Visa themselves do not charge.

No they don't charge - they just authenticate the card with a transient value. In the same way I've seen reports that cards from other providers are authenticated with a small value.

And - Halifax Secure or Verified by Visa - they all piggy back down to the same screen when processing a transaction these days.