store card trickery

eminah

Hello

Hope you can help.
I would like to know if I must pay the last three month's late fee plus interest on a New Look store credit card.
I made an online money transfer from my Nationwide flex account to the New Look Ikano account for the full amount I owed for a purchase (£24.98) in April this year. The transfer was made on 2nd June, and the payment was to reach New Look by 4th June. The payment should have instantly showed up in their account as it was taken from my flex account immediately, or so I believed I had paid on time...however I hadn't noticed that the due date had written underneath in brackets 'allow 5 working days' . Do digital money transfers not show up immediately?

I'm now being hounded by Ikano to pay 3 months charges plus interest.
Shall I pay or wait until they take me to court? I think that the way they present the 'due' date is misleading and many people could be caught out, thinking that they paid on time.

Miss_Havisham

just to clarify, was it the New Look invoice that said "allow 5 working days " or the Halifax on-line payment system ?

Malky

What's not to understand about the due date? It clearly states 'allow 5 days' so payment should have been made on 30th May at the latest.
You're clutching at straws for your own mistake.
Pay the extra interest and put it down to experience. Is it really worth going to court and/or screwing up your credit rating for the sake of 24.98 + interest?

Eonel

Payments made to a credit card using the Faster Payment Service (FPS) will clear quicker. But you have to make sure that Nationwide and New Look accepted it as an FPS payment at that time. Other electronic payments will take a number of days to clear depending on how you made the payment.

While you sort it out, I strongly recommend you pay the late payment fees now. You need to prevent any further damage being done to your credit record.

Then make a complaint to First Look in writing and ask them to explain why they charged you and if they accepted FPS payments. If they got it wrong they will refund you the late payment fees.

eminah

Hi there,
the 'allow 5 working days' was on the New Look bill. It also happened to be a long bank holiday weekend (jubilee) and the due date was actually a bank holiday. I will look into the faster payment service, however I don't see why the electronic online payment did not show up immediately in the New Look account, this 'allow five working days' is a piece of nonsense when it comes to electronic payments. Fair enough if it's a cheque or cash they have to process. Their database could trace my customer number and payment down to the minute at which the money was transferred. What I want to know is WHY then do they need 5 working days to process?

MoneySaver_x

I have a store card with New Look and transfer to Ikano normally with no problems. If you sent it on the 2nd June, which was a Saturday, and the payment was due on a Bank Holiday Monday, no money will have officially been received until the Tuesday? It will have shown probably that it had left your account, but will not have been received. Meaning that your payment was late for that month, and you would receive a charge.

StuC75

A more appropriate point is why leave it so close to the due date to make the payment. nothing stopping you making the payment anytime between the Statement Date and the 'latest payment by date'.

chattychappy

Malky wrote: »

What's not to understand about the due date? It clearly states 'allow 5 days' so payment should have been made on 30th May at the latest.
You're clutching at straws for your own mistake.

Seems you don't understand it. "Allow 5 days" doesn't mean they are free to credit the account 5 days after it was sent. In this case, what with bank holidays etc., it does seem the OP was too late. In general, institutions must credit monies when received for value.

StuC75 wrote: »

A more appropriate point is why leave it so close to the due date to make the payment. nothing stopping you making the payment anytime between the Statement Date and the 'latest payment by date'.

Perhaps cashflow stopped the OP? Or it was just a mistake?

DevCoder

eminah wrote: »

Hi there,
I will look into the faster payment service, however I don't see why the electronic online payment did not show up immediately in the New Look account, this 'allow five working days' is a piece of nonsense when it comes to electronic payments.

No it's not, if it's not processed as a FPS or if either correspondent doesn't support FPS then it can take longer than "immediately"

bengal-stripe

eminah wrote: »

The transfer was made on 2nd June, and the payment was to reach New Look by 4th June.

The payment was made on a Saturday and was due to arrive on bank holiday Monday. Which means there was not a single working day, let alone the requested five, allowed.

The payment might have arrived at New Look's bank on Saturday, but why should the retailer allocate the money to the appropriate account over a weekend?

I have no idea how New Look operates, but, for example, MBNA makes it clear they will not credit 'Faster Payments' to individual accounts outside of working hours. Monies that arrive after 'Close of business' will be credited during the next working day, which would have been Tuesday at this particular weekend.

New Look might well use that same modus operandi.

opinions4u

Do digital money transfers not show up immediately?

no. They have to be there by the end of the following working day.