Iceland to overhaul online payment system after shoppers hit with multiple 'pending' charges

MSE_Laura_F

Our news story is now live:

Iceland to overhaul online payment system after shoppers hit with multiple 'pending' charges

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/2020/06/Iceland-to-overhaul-payment-system/

grumbler

What's more, while an amount is ring-fenced it cannot be spent or used to cover other debits from an account, which means some have then been pushed into their overdraft when other payments have come out of their account.

This essentially means that a pending payment can make an account overdrawn.

Hard to believe that this is true, but if it is, then IMO it's the bank to be blamed, not Farmfoods.

[Deleted User]

Probably a neo bank that classifies authorisations (ring-fencing of funds) as an actual transaction.
P.S. Grumbler ~ Farmfoods definitely isn't to blame 

Consumerist

We've had a few orders from Iceland in recent weeks but had no idea this was going on. We pay by credit card and, fortunately, have a significant available credit balance so have not noticed any problems.

Steve_L

Another reason why amending home shopping orders is a bad idea,

The supermarket / credit card combination I use changed how they accounted for any "unavailable" items and items sold by weight a few weeks ago.

miller

I take it the Iceland T&Cs allow for this (in as much as some hotels do to hold rooms or ensure incidentals can be paid for). If not, then I would complain to the bank for a refund of overdraft charges as the additional authorisation holds are unauthorised. Sainsbury's Petrol Filling Station Pay at Pump can put through a hold of a £1, then correctly use that authorisation code to put through the correct amount as one transaction and retailers can cancel authorisation holds themselves. It's not the customer's fault Iceland's systems are poor.

Stompa

Asda do this all the time with credit card payments, I don't know if the same applies with debit cards.

KxMx

From reading the article they are reverting to charging on day of delivery. 
They moved away from that early 2019 and I guess it didn't work! 

MrsStepford

After I was scammed without the card ever having been used in actual shops, my bank advised me unofficially, to use PayPal online. I have used it for a couple of Iceland shops recently. Both times, when I edited the order, I got a message at checkout, that my card had been refused, though I was using PayPal. It even suggested that I used PayPal as an alternative ! I contacted Iceland online and got a generic email about debit cards, which was useless. I took my  changes (extra products) off and hoped for the best. The original order turned up and I was charged correctly. I suspect that their whole payment system was wonky. 

Bacman

I always pay by PayPal wherever I can especially with sites i've not used before; as then the company concerned do not get your card details for payment so if they are dishonest, or their lack of security allows a hacker to get card details from a website, they will only have your name and address (which they need to ship your order to), no card details. PayPal payments are safer therefore. If you don't have credit on your PayPal account, you can still use that as your payment method by selecting your credit card as payment via PayPal option.

I used Iceland a few weeks back for online delivery, used PayPal, went smoothly no problems and correct amount taken from PayPal.