Could I chargeback a dodgy fine?

andywarb

Hi guys,

My family and I recently took a trip to Paris and were using the Metro to get around. We bought a book of tickets and used them to get in and out of the stations as you would normally.

Unknown to us, on our trip to the Eiffel Tower one of the ticket gates took our ticket and let us through but failed to print onto the ticket (it must have been out of ink or something). When we arrived at the other end, they had a couple of very surly plain clothes "ticket inspectors" who checked the ticket, then cornered us and insisted we pay a €30 fine. The guy could not explain why the system had failed only that we were liable for the fine and he would call the police if we failed to pay.

I refused to give him cash and he produced a mobile card machine to take the cost of the fine and issued a receipt and returned the "invalid" ticket. Once we went out into a lighter area we looked at the problem ticket and could see it had been printed but it was just incredibly feint. Later a ticket office confirmed the ticket was valid and we shouldn't have been fined but offered no way to get the money back.

Do you think this case would be valid for a chargeback? It's only €30 but it's the principle more than anything else - the ticket inspectors were completely unreasonable and refused to listen to reason - we had done nothing wrong, the failure was completely down to their equipment.

Any advice / suggestions welcome.

Thanks

Andy

geekonthepc

You can certainly try - give the card issuer a call and explain the situation. There's no harm in asking.

ic

I wouldn't have thought so - you were issued an on the spot fine, and paid it with your card. The validity of the fine is of no concern to the card company - who are they to judge? (would a credit card company overturn the decision of ticket inspector in the UK?). If you want to argue the ticket, you should do so with the metro authorities. Why didn't you go back to the inspectors that fined you once you could see the card?

Did you actually see credible ID? Did you get paperwork? That's my only thought, that they could have been fraudsters...

agrinnall

ic wrote: »

Did you actually see credible ID? Did you get paperwork? That's my only thought, that they could have been fraudsters...

Carrying a card machine - seems like an extreme way of defrauding holidaymakers of a few Euros.

regency_man

agrinnall wrote: »

Carrying a card machine - seems like an extreme way of defrauding holidaymakers of a few Euros.

Surely you mean an extremely profitable way of defrauding holidaymakers?

Setting up a front company and getting a merchant account at a bank would be pittance compared to the profits here - lets say they only stop 2 obviously out-of-town tourists per hour (which is a low estimate) and do a 10 hour day - that's €600 per day. The costs are minute - just card handling fees, so they're still making close to €3000 per week - €156,000 per year.

As the OP said - they didn't want to hand over cash, but the card machine made it seem more legitimate and they handed over a card and authorised the payment - a perfect con.

The alarm bells should have been ringing:
- "Plain clothes"
- "Surly"
- "cornered us"
- "insisted we pay"
- "call the police if we failed to pay"

ic

Exactly my thinking and why I said it. What's to say they're not just cloning the cards and recording the PIN entered?

withnell

regency_man wrote: »

- "Surly"
- "cornered us"
- "insisted we pay"
- "call the police if we failed to pay"

Sounds like British trains too though - they all have card machines!

dalesrider

andywarb wrote: »

Do you think this case would be valid for a chargeback? It's only €30 but it's the principle more than anything else - the ticket inspectors were completely unreasonable and refused to listen to reason - we had done nothing wrong, the failure was completely down to their equipment.

Any advice / suggestions welcome.

Thanks

Andy

In a word..

NO.

No basis for any chargeback here.

Why would they need to call the police?

When you went to the ticket office did they agree that this was a genuine fine?

regency_man

withnell wrote: »

Sounds like British trains too though - they all have card machines!

I wonder who the vendor is listed as on the OP's card statement? That would be a big clue.

ahxcjb

Short answer: yes, you can. I've initiated a chargeback against a clamping firm for a fee I paid under duress. It's important to write 'under duress' when you pay any fine in my opinion, not that writing it was important in Barclaycard successfully charging back the funds.

Good luck, and hopefully your credit card firm can stick it to those cowboys.

pvt

ahxcjb wrote: »

It's important to write 'under duress' when you pay any fine in my opinion,

How would you suggest that be done on a chip and pin machine?