Paying a big amount by debit card

book12

Soon I will be paying the rest of the amount of a used car in the showroom. The amount is £5000, which will be paid by debit card. Paid the deposit a few days ago to secure it aftet a test drive.

After putting my pin in the card machine to pay the remaining amount of £5000, what would usually happen:

1. Bank blocks the payment as it's an unusual amount, as well as card getting blocked as it doesn't match the normal spending pattern.
2. Payment goes through without any phone call from the bank.
3. Payment goes through with a text message to confirm if the transaction is genuine.
4. Payment blocked with a text message to confirm if the transaction is genuine, and if it is answer the text and payment then goes through.
5. Other scenarios - please specify.

Alternatvely, I was thinking of paying the amount by bankers draft. Is this a good idea?

Anybody that purchased a used car using a debit card with an amount of more than £5000 before, please share your experiences of what happened in terms of the card payment.

Hopefully the transaction won't get declined as it will be embarrassing.

grumbler

Nothing happened when I paid £10K with my Santander card. And no, it wasn't my "normal spending pattern".

Nothing embarrassing if it is declined. I think garages are familiar with such situations and know how to act. Don't waste money on a banker's draft.

[Deleted User]

I bought a car for £5500 - paid the deposit on a credit card and the balance by debit card. Like grumbler, no problems experienced.

keiran

why not telephone the card issuer to put them on alert of the large transaction?

molerat

I phoned Santander when I was about to to purchase a car and they said they could not make a note on the system. I paid £14.5K on the card and it went through straight away, no refer at all. I never use the card for spending so it was definitely not in my normal spending pattern. On the other hand a couple of years ago I bought a car for £7K then went to tax it at the PO and they declined the card, the cashpoint declined cash out so I had to go into branch and get cash over the counter.

p00hsticks

I seem to recall that my payment of £8k+ a few years back went straight through without even a referral.

I imagine that even though it's not an amount that I'd spend everyday, banks recognise that there are certain types of merchants (car & furniture sales, travel agents etc) which tend to sell 'big ticket' items, and so perhaps give them more leeway before flagging up a transaction.

And the fact that (at the time) I wouldn't normally have kept that kind of money in a current account and so could be seen transferring it into the account in the days beforehand might also have provided some sort of assurance of it bein a legitimate planned purchase if any bank employee had had a look.

realaledrinker

Yep paid over £20K on Santander, Co-op and Nationwide in the recent-ish past with no problems

securityguy

I've bought cars and paid for new kitchens on debit card, £15k+ in each case, without any excitement. The kitchen was done card not present, for extra fun,

paragon909

Sometimes payments get referred where the merchant has to call for manual processing but very rarely, I think banks may block a card if they see a huge amount spent in a short time without having any previous records of spending,

Happened to me when I spent money on a car and got insurance and paid for it all on my card.

eskbanker

book12 wrote: »

Soon I will be paying the rest of the amount of a used car in the showroom. The amount is £5000, which will be paid by debit card. Paid the deposit a few days ago to secure it aftet a test drive.

Did you pay the deposit by credit card? If not, it may be worth putting through a token CC payment as part of the balance (theoretically as low as a penny) in order to benefit from Section 75 protection for the purchase.

FOREVER21

Last June collected my new car and paid the outstanding, £9k on my debit card ( Barclays) , transaction was declined.
No problem, garage was used to the situation, they made a telephone call to card company I spoke to adviser I was asked to reply to a couple of security questions , card then accepted.

Don' t worry about it , no embarrassing experience garage will have seen it before.