Internet banking overpayment

FireWyrm

growler834 wrote: »

I hadn't left it too late - statement emailed to me (as the norm) on 31st August, payment by due date 12th September. I paid on 1st Sept, an hour before I was due to leave for my holiday - I wasn't due home until 10th Sept & didn't want to pay so close to due date. In normal circs I would have hung on the phone to check if the payment had gone through but I was running short of time.

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You knew when you were going on holiday, you knew when your statement was due and when the payment was due. You should have made alternative arrangements such as setting up a DD for the minimum, or just plain mailing the cheque only. They werent to know that you didnt mean for them to present the cheque. You paid twice. It was largely your own fault. I doubt that you will get anything else out of them baring basic compensation. However, if it is of any use, most banks will refund your telephone call cost at a flat rate of 15p per minute if you complain to the right department.

growler834

FireWyrm wrote: »

You knew when you were going on holiday, you knew when your statement was due and when the payment was due. You should have made alternative arrangements such as setting up a DD for the minimum, or just plain mailing the cheque only. They werent to know that you didnt mean for them to present the cheque. You paid twice. It was largely your own fault. I doubt that you will get anything else out of them baring basic compensation. However, if it is of any use, most banks will refund your telephone call cost at a flat rate of 15p per minute if you complain to the right department.

Yes I knew I was going on holiday & when my payment was due & I was paying my bill as I do every month for the last 8 years - via their website. I always pay them on the 1st of the month as that is when my income goes in my account so there was nothing different in this payment date other than the fact that I was leaving my home shortly after for a holiday. My other CC bill was paid via their website without a problem. Without a crystal ball I didn't know the 'offending' website was going to have a 'technical problem' & should therefore have used 'alternative' means of payment from the start. If I know I'm away when the bill is due I usually get a member of my family to send the cheque I have already prepared but in this instance I was paying it before I left - I had no reason to think I had to do otherwise. So it's my fault I tried to pay my bill as I usually do using the Internet facility they provide for people to use & my fault I didn't know their website might have a malfunction?

Looking at this from another direction - if I pay via the internet & it says I have paid successfully but then, because of a technical problem, it doesn't show on my account & they blame me for not paying is that my fault too? My CC provider doesn't give me a reference number to quote to prove I've paid (like my other card provider does) so it would be my word against theirs that I had.

If CC providers want you to use their Internet facility to pay (so they can be paperless & save money) they shouldn't then blame the customer if their website throws a wobbly & the customer ends up out of pocket. Valuable lesson learned - I won't be using the Internet again to pay my bill - I will go back to paying by post and then it can be MY fault when it goes missing in the post!

MABLE

growler834 wrote: »

Yes I knew I was going on holiday & when my payment was due & I was paying my bill as I do every month for the last 8 years - via their website. I always pay them on the 1st of the month as that is when my income goes in my account so there was nothing different in this payment date other than the fact that I was leaving my home shortly after for a holiday. My other CC bill was paid via their website without a problem. Without a crystal ball I didn't know the 'offending' website was going to have a 'technical problem' & should therefore have used 'alternative' means of payment from the start. If I know I'm away when the bill is due I usually get a member of my family to send the cheque I have already prepared but in this instance I was paying it before I left - I had no reason to think I had to do otherwise. So it's my fault I tried to pay my bill as I usually do using the Internet facility they provide for people to use & my fault I didn't know their website might have a malfunction?

Looking at this from another direction - if I pay via the internet & it says I have paid successfully but then, because of a technical problem, it doesn't show on my account & they blame me for not paying is that my fault too? My CC provider doesn't give me a reference number to quote to prove I've paid (like my other card provider does) so it would be my word against theirs that I had.

If CC providers want you to use their Internet facility to pay (so they can be paperless & save money) they shouldn't then blame the customer if their website throws a wobbly & the customer ends up out of pocket. Valuable lesson learned - I won't be using the Internet again to pay my bill - I will go back to paying by post and then it can be MY fault when it goes missing in the post!

Words fail me!

chattychappy

MABLE wrote: »

Words fail me!

Yep. You did little more than bang on about DD.

Gets a bit tedious the way rather than address the problem at hand, people pile in and say "should have signed a DD". Yet there are plenty of threads on people getting into trouble with DDs too.

growler834

Just an update -

I sent my letter of complaint & asked for the overdraft fees to be paid. My CC provider quickly contacted me & agreed to pay my fees. They have also paid me a small sum in compensation. I am most impressed with their customer service.

Thank you to those who gave constructive advice.

chattychappy

And thanks to you for getting back with the outcome. Sounds like common sense prevailed.

pacontracting

chattychappy wrote: »

And thanks to you for getting back with the outcome. Sounds like common sense prevailed.

It amazes me on here how some people will happily take the 'Romans - marvellous race' stance (quote from Life of Brian by the way) regarding the banks i.e they can do no wrong.

Totally agree that the bank should refund any charges in this case. The OP made more than a decent attempt to pay the bill and shouldn't be penalised due to shoddy IT. In fact, I don't think most banks would argue.