Strip club scam

Burnz0

if the barman was putting it through a card machine surely that would mean the management must be part of the scam (as they surely need to account for all receipts etc) so I doubt they'll take kindly to be accusing one of their staff?

Everynamestaken

hmm...not sure what to think here.

Was "cash is king" ever a more appropriate statement?

Ask management to check the receipts on the PDQ machine.

Nevermind what size the doorstaff are, of course you should ask the barman for a clear story, as it appears you don't have the answers to it.

Guess you have learnt an extremely valuable lesson though. Always check receipts, and keep a very close eye and what money comes in and out.

bluelass

Are you sure you didn't pay the strippers for a private dance? They are known to charge silly prices for that sort of thing (I have never been to one btw). It sounds a bit iffy to me;).

Burnz0

I definitely did pay for a private dance but no way would I have agreed to pay that sort of money. I checked their website today - apparently it's £4.50 a beer. I had £200ish in cash with me so I'd think that would have covered me for a few dances and a few beers at least. My friend says when he clocked the £3000 on the till and said to me why are you paying that much - I said there's no way im paying that and the barman sheepishly cancelled the transaction (and I have the receipt evidence to prove it). It seems like he probably already tried that successfully without me noticing and it is these transactions that went through and thus require disputing.
I've emailed them today after several calls over the weekend to say that I think there was something up with their machine as proven by all the declined transactions with minutes of each other and so can they just refund the two that somehow made it through. I've deliberately not mentioned that I know it was a scam rather than just a machine fault and have thrown in that I only mentioned it to the police as a precautionary measure advised by my card company. Hopefully they'll just agree to cancel the payments on the basis that they'd prefer not to have it looked into any further. I've also said I need confirmation of what all the amounts are for - cancelled or successful - as this should explain (or shouldn't as the case will be) how one minute x number of drinks + x dances cost £3000+ and then a minute later when that is declined it goes through at £1500+. It's obvious to me that they were putting through reduced amounts trying to see what would actually go get passed by the bank and credit card company. How I didn't clock onto this is the most embarrassing bit

eskbanker

Burnz0 wrote: »

How I didn't clock onto this is the most embarrassing bit

It must be said that there is some competition for this status!

Burnz0 wrote: »

very drunk i'd say! [...] I don't know what was going on

Burnz0 wrote: »

Stupidly, I told the credit card company that was charged that I lost my card therefore it was a fake transaction (as I never came home with it)

Burnz0 wrote: »

I definitely did pay for a private dance

sentientpoet

I had a friend several years back who ended up in a strip club on his birthday, and only realised the next day - when his wife tried to use the company credit card and it was declined (oops) - that they had stung him for £3250. He didn't really have much memory of what had happened.

He contacted the club and it turned out the machine operator, either through error or intent, had not put the decimal point in - the actual charge was £32.50. The club reconciled it against the receipts and refunded the difference.

However, in your case it sounds a little more deliberate than that.

tripled

sentientpoet wrote: »

He contacted the club and it turned out the machine operator, either through error or intent, had not put the decimal point in

Exactly what I was thinking. OP, deliberate or not, I'd suggest starting on this line with the club as the management are more likely to be receptive to "there's been a mistake" than "you bunch of scammers". I also wouldn't mention your memory (or lack of) - don't make anything up, but be confident it's a mistake when you speak to them.

callum9999

derps wrote: »

I doubt the bank will be able to get anything out of the club. If the transactions are PIN verified I wouldn't have thought there'd be any grounds to raise a dispute with the merchant.

Since the OP was in the club and remembers entering his PIN on the card terminal, I can't imagine the bank will want to consider footing the bill for this drunken mistake. If the card was out of the OP's possession when the transactions took place, this might be different (I know the OP said the card was in his coat at some point) but convincing the bank that this happened will a tough sell - especially since it would seem that the OP definitely did try to put these transactions through, albeit while drunk.

I don't doubt that the sleazy proprietors have exploited you, OP, and I sympathise that your naivet! with this sort of establishment has possibly cost you so much.

Then if there's no grounds for dispute the OP's bank won't refund them...

I'm not saying the OP's in the right or should be getting their money back (though the incorrect decimal - either deliberate or accidental - seems most likely), just refuting the many claims that the bank(s) will be out of pocket. Either the OP or the Club will be out of pocket, not the banks.

UsetheFORCE

JReacher1 wrote: »

Did you pay contactless in McDonald's? Ive noticed before when i pay contactless in McDonald's it never appears on my pending transactions and just comes off the card the next day.

If I use my BARCLAYCARD contactless anywhere (including McDonalds), it doesn't register as a pending transaction.

If I use my CAPITAL ONE contactless, the reverse is true as it shows up as a pending transaction straight away.

There must be different levels of authorisation, my CAP ONE must still seek it at the POS but my BARCLAYCARD must not seek it at all!

Burnz0

sentientpoet wrote: »

I had a friend several years back who ended up in a strip club on his birthday, and only realised the next day - when his wife tried to use the company credit card and it was declined (oops) - that they had stung him for £3250. He didn't really have much memory of what had happened.

He contacted the club and it turned out the machine operator, either through error or intent, had not put the decimal point in - the actual charge was £32.50. The club reconciled it against the receipts and refunded the difference.

However, in your case it sounds a little more deliberate than that.

the only issue with that is that they've only actually managed to put through 2 charges out of an attempted 7 or 8 so that would suggest that even if the ones that did go through were a decimal point issue, the other times that failed must have meant I got free drinks- which seems very unlikely.... At the end of the day I really don't know as I remember very little (which is in no way unusual for me even after only a few drinks) so everything I say is purely guesswork. All I can say is that it is very possible that my card was out of my possession, the failed & successful transaction history suggests someone (me or otherwise) was ringing through massive transactions one after the other for different amounts, therefore presumably different things e.g. a champagne bottle, then another type 5 minutes later etc. This is the thing I'd expect they'll need to justify - ignoring the two that went through, what were the failed attempts for? If they were genuine mistakes by the barman (unlikely) then is it possibly he genuinely put through the two that did go through incorrectly? When I spoke to ActionnFraud they were very insistent that it sounded very dodgy but also said my bank is the first port of call and if they fail to pay up/cancel the transactions going down the police route will take much longer. I did think the club should be able to provide cctv of every transaction since it was all time recorded but it wouldn't surprise me if they'd rather not show footage of an obviously drunk person fumbling through his pockets trying to pay £3000 for a beer (if that's how it happened!)