Visa Debit Chargeback

[Deleted User]

I paid some fees (£100>) to an estate agent for services they never provided with my RBS Visa Debit card. Can I claim these back under the Visa Debit chargeback scheme or is it highly unlikely?

LeeSouthEast

How long ago I think is the key question. There is a time limit but I can't recall for definite - possibly in the 3-6 month region?

ValHaller

First of all, what is your legal right to the money being returned? What was the money for?

You need to be clear on your right to the money here, because if you did a chargeback but had no right to the money, you could find yourself on the wrong end of a court claim

[Deleted User]

It was less than a month ago. They are refusing to refund it even though it does not state in their terms that it was non-refundable.

wealdroam

Deleted_User wrote: »

It was less than a month ago. They are refusing to refund it even though it does not state in their terms that it was non-refundable.

But as said earlier, what is your right to the money?

Re-read the questions in post #3.

Even if you pursued a chargeback, the banks would ask the estate agent for their opinion, and if the arguement was good, reverse the chargeback.

ValHaller

Deleted_User wrote: »

It was less than a month ago. They are refusing to refund it even though it does not state in their terms that it was non-refundable.

Just explain exactly what happened. Then you will get useful advice on how to get the money back if you have a right to it. And if you have no right to the money you will be advised why not.

But nothing else of any use can be said until you explain what happened.

bris

T&C's don't need to state that any thing is refundable or not so if in doubt contract law applies.

Your right to the deposit will be determined by the contract you had with the estate agent and whether or not you have the right to the refund or not under contract law.

Without knowing more no one here can help as to whether you have a claim or not.

[Deleted User]

Paid an application fee to rent a property. Few days later phoned me up to say I needed a guarantor. No guarantor available so they said can't have property and won't issue any of the application fee back.

They never said that I might need a guarantor when I was paying the money and filling the form in. Terms on the form only say no refund if you give false information or mislead them.

Buzby

I don't believe you can - you are trying to get money back for a service (non-tangeable goods). You have no s75 protection for a debit card, and you will be relying on Visa's own scheme - however, this only covers tangeable goods - not a dispute over service provision.

As it was you who could not provide a guarantor (a pretty reasonable request) the agent did everything else to secure the service you required. It would not have been conditional on you getting entry as the work would be done even if your references came back and they declined you.

Your rights are pretty limited unless they promised a full refund in the case of no tenancy offer being completed.

Caz3121

Deleted_User wrote: »

Paid an application fee to rent a property. Few days later phoned me up to say I needed a guarantor. No guarantor available so they said can't have property and won't issue any of the application fee back.

They never said that I might need a guarantor when I was paying the money and filling the form in. Terms on the form only say no refund if you give false information or mislead them.

Was the request for a guarantor after they had credit checked you?
(you say in other posts that you have bad credit so it may be that rather than just reject your application for failing the credit check they have requested a guarantor to assist this going ahead)

ThumbRemote

Buzby wrote: »

As it was you who could not provide a guarantor (a pretty reasonable request) the agent did everything else to secure the service you required. It would not have been conditional on you getting entry as the work would be done even if your references came back and they declined you.

Your rights are pretty limited unless they promised a full refund in the case of no tenancy offer being completed.

It might be reasonable to ask for a guarantor, but if there was no mention of this when the agents took the money then they can't just impose it as an additional requirement later.

As it stands it sounds like the contract has been breached by the agents, not by the OP, so a refund is due.

(I don't rule out there might be some term in some T&Cs that covers this; this obviously depends on whether T&Cs were issued and agreed to, what the wording is, whether it's a valid term etc).