Interest charge on Santander credit card, told I had D Debit setup

life_nit

Hello,

I've sent a message to santander regarding my 'zero' credit card and I'm currently awaiting a response.

I sent a message to them via their secure message tool online asking if I had a direct debit setup to take payment from my current account to pay off my credit card on 19th june. they replied on the 22nd. and I have just noticed an interest charge as of 28th july of the following month!

My initial message read "Could you please confirm that my credit card account settings are setup to automatically pay my current balance off so I don't get charged before the due date"

To which they replied

"We can confirm a direct debit is applied to your credit card to action the full statement balance"

"if the confirmation cannot be verified we advise a manual payment is actioned"

I don't often check my online accounts with scrutiny but trusted this was in place. I've requested a refund a direct debit to actually be setup. What are the chances I get this amount back from them?

I've had sufficient funds in my current account to pay off the balance the whole time and trusted them to take this as per clear instruction prior.

[Deleted User]

Their wording is a little vague, but it effectively says, "yes, a DD is on your account, but please check to see if it is set up to take from your end."

This is because a DD needs time to set up and they need to give you at least 10 days notice (on the appropriate statement) that the payment will be taken by DD. Did it say this on your statement?

They may do a goodwill refund, particularly if it's your first statement.

jonesMUFCforever

OP let this be a very important lesson to you - you must make time to look at all statements whether online or in paper form.
Not only it probably would have told you that for this particular period you had to make a manual payment.
Like previous poster said - ask for leniency but make a faster payment now to pay the card off.

life_nit

The reply I received was as follows.

" Hello Mr xxxxx

Thank you for your email.

We can confirm that you are able to set up your direct debit online.

To register for direct debit, select the Credit Card tab on your Santander online banking and then select Set Up/ Amend Direct Debit located on the left hand side of the screen.

You will then be asked to enter the details of the direct debit you wish set up, including the sort code and account number the payment is coming from, and the amount you wish to pay.

You will then be asked to confirm that you have read the Direct Debit full Terms & Conditions included on the Direct Debit Guarantee.
"

As we can see they have completely failed to address this message personally and take no responsibility in the matter regarding telling me I had a direct debit setup previously with a huge time frame.
I find it absurd how they can operate like this. You can imagine that by doing this to every customer they'd amass a huge amount of money.

I've asked to escalate the matter further. Because I find it extremely poor service to reply in such a generic automated way.

bengal-stripe

life_nit wrote: »

To which they replied
"We can confirm a direct debit is applied to your credit card to action the full statement balance"
"if the confirmation cannot be verified we advise a manual payment is actioned"

life_nit wrote: »

........I had a direct debit setup previously with a huge time frame.

Was the DD not collected for a long time as you might not have used the card? If a DD has been dormant for 13 months, it usually gets cancelled by your bank to avoid potential abuse.

I believe MBNA tried to tell you: "Although we have a DD on our records, it might have been cancelled. Check with your bank and if the DD is no longer in place, you have to make a manual payment."

Did you check with your bank whether the DD was still active?

life_nit

Resolved. Santander accepted responsibility for the missunderstanding and refunded the full interest amount and setup my direct debit within 5 minutes of talking over the phone

:j

fromtheshires

Never use secure messaging to contact Abbey. They speak in riddles and tongues. In both instances I have used the secure message service I either got a reply that was evasive or not even responding to the question and giving a reply to something different I didn't ask about. Always speak to someone on the phone and you can't go far wrong Ive found.

life_nit

fromtheshires wrote: »

Never use secure messaging to contact Abbey. They speak in riddles and tongues. In both instances I have used the secure message service I either got a reply that was evasive or not even responding to the question and giving a reply to something different I didn't ask about. Always speak to someone on the phone and you can't go far wrong Ive found.

Totally agree.

eskbanker

All a bit late now I know but it's very straightforward to check if/how a direct debit is set up for your Zero card within online banking, so if you got as far as being able to send a secure message then the DD setting was only a couple of clicks away!