Charges for expired debit card

campbeji

Hi all,

I have just been charged £25 by RAC insurance for a failed payment. The payment was via a card that I had registered with them, however at the date of the last payment, 8th September 2016, the card had expired. I checked with my bank, Nationwide, and they have no record of payment being requested.

I have two queries, however both Nationwide and RAC Insurance tell me to talk to the other. The queries are;

1/ If RAC try to process a payment via a card that is expired, am I liable for the fees (surely that should ask for a new card)
2/ Is a fee of £25 fair for something like this.

The RAC have told me that if I don't pay the missed payment plus the £25 they will cancel the insurance and charge me for all of those fees too. So it looks like I will need to pay and make a complaint later (if I am going to).

Any ideas/advice.

Many Thanks
Jim

teddysmum

Did your bank not send you a new card a few weeks before the expiry date?


Perhaps the insurer's software will not allow them to process a payment if the card has expired, so there would be no request to the bank.

forgotmyname

The RAC have taken funds without me giving them the new card details. I was phoning to haggle down the price and then i said do you need the new card details because the old one has expired and they said no.

jonesMUFCforever

The real situation here is that you gave the RAC A CONTINIOUS AUTHORITY to cover renewals etc.
Until you revoke that authority they have the right to ask Nationwide for payments.
If the bank declined the payment because the card was out of date you have not paid when you should have - the charges if you were advised of them when taking the insurance out are valid.

My renewals always quote the last 4 digits of the card - I check this against my current card and if it has changed advide the company.

agrinnall

I'm puzzled, because normally a card expiring does not invalidate a CPA, the card number is simply a conduit to your current account so if that account is still open and had enough money then it should have been taken. It sounds to me more like the RAC attempted to take the payment but it failed because you didn't have the funds available.

campbeji

Hi,

Teddysmum - Yes I got a new card. I thought that I had set up a DD so I didn't think to phone the RAC with the new card. It seems strange that a big company would have a system that can't recognise an out of date card, it would be a simple check.

Forgotmyname - Strange, they told me that If they didn't have current card details it probably wouldn't go through.

JonesMUFCforever - Yes I understand the setup, I wanted to keep paying them. My point is that they have charged me a fine when it appears that they used an out of date card. The charge is marked as a failed payment fee, they told me that this is because they get charged for it. When I process an out of date card (through my business) I don't get charged for it. If the charge was because the payment wasn't made then would they not call it a late payment fee.

A quick email from their system to remind me to update the card would have solved the situation with minimal fuss.

Thanks
Jim

campbeji

Hi Agrinall,

I'm puzzled about why you would say that I didn't have the money in the account, perhaps you didn't read the bit in the original post that said that when I talked to the Nationwide that they had no record of a request for the money from RAC.

Thanks
Jim

jonesMUFCforever

campbeji wrote: »

Hi,





JonesMUFCforever - Yes I understand the setup, I wanted to keep paying them. My point is that they have charged me a fine when it appears that they used an out of date card. The charge is marked as a failed payment fee, they told me that this is because they get charged for it. When I process an out of date card (through my business) I don't get charged for it. If the charge was because the payment wasn't made then would they not call it a late payment fee.

A quick email from their system to remind me to update the card would have solved the situation with minimal fuss.

Thanks
Jim

Sorry you got this the wrong way round - up to you to make sure that the payment method you chose is up to date.

campbeji

Hi Jonesmufcforever,

Perhaps it is up to me to notify them, but i'm pretty sure they are not supposed to take charges against expired cards. Even if they are, it is at least stupid on their part, it delays their payments and annoys their clients. I'm certainly not going to use them again.

This problem did not occur with the other companies that I have the card registered with, they sent emails and I updated the card details. No problems resulted.

Thanks
Jim

nyermen

One thing - I hope this is RAC membership rather than car insurance arranged through them?
If it's car insurance, be careful because they can cancel the insurance, and with the added pain of having to declare forever more that you had insurance cancelled.

campbeji

Hi Nyermen, Yes it was car insurance. No problem with it being canceled as I will have paid the money before it gets canceled. It's just annoying that I have to pay the £25 fee as well.

Thanks
Jim