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CPA mess - subscription taken from expired card after 8 failures, cannot refund to expired card
GeeeM
Posts: 292 Forumite
TL:DR Angry man in recurring payment fail, cancel you subscriptions, don't assume an expired card means you won't be charged!
OK, so I understand a bit about CPA's! That, even if my card expires, the retailer can get the new / replacement card details.. Sneaky subscription model and the "churn" of auto renewal. Costs us all millions in forgotten subscriptions. This is a bit different maybe...
So, I have an annual subscription to a password manager site, completely forgotten about it - as you do, I then started getting emails from them saying they could not take payment for my annual subscription. OK, that's because my card has expired... Fine, I was busy, and can't really afford it anyway so I'll just let them degrade me to the free version as the emails warned. I got about 8 emails, then they stopped...
By chance, I logged onto my bank account and noticed a charge of £37.44 to the company... Yep, they'd taken the money... Looked at my account, still the old expired card details on file... I phoned the bank.
The bank confirmed there had been 8 failed attempts to take the money from my expired card, then it had gone through on the 9th attempt. The transaction had posted against my old card, not my new one... The bank just said, "oh, you know, if they keep trying, it'll go through eventually", that raised some red flags. I know my way around the FCA handbook... I used to work in IT, with the banks on Payment Processing systems, I cannot imagine some code that says "If retry attemp = 9, Then OK, he's persistent, why not?"
The bank was no help. I raised a complaint, mastercard washed there hands, and so did the bank - both saying, "Oh, the computer sometimes does that" - yeah, right - that sounds like a huge flaw to me, how would you even test that outcome, infinite monkeys, with infinite typewriters?
So, I contacted the password provider. they were cool - downgraded my account and refunded me the £37.44 - said it might take 10 days to come through. Funnily enough, I never got an email saying payment had been taken, or an email saying it had been refunded. They were happy to email me saying it had failed. There was an invoice hidden deep in the account, which customer support pointed out to me.... It's not even visible in the app, you have to hunt for it in the browser, and download a pdf! Anyway....
10 days later, no money... I phoned the bank again... Oh, yes, the refund came for the original payment, but because it was for a expired card it was rejected! So - they could take money from an expired card, but not refund to it.... Again the bank and Mastercard just fobbed me off saying - contact the retailer and get them to keep retrying the refund until it goes through!!! So, I'm supposed to contact this password manager site every 10 days and get them to retry the refund until it suceeds? You're having a laugh, based on it taking 9 attempts to be taken, I'll be here in 3 months time! The old card is now deleted from their site and the CPA is cancelled. I'm, not sure if they can even refund again, without the card on file.. I don't want to give them different details, if they can take payment from a card, they should be able to refund to it.
CPA's seem really shady to me, for starters, why retry 9 times, pretty sure the FCA says a reasonable number of times - assuming lack of ability to pay on failure, (I am in financial difficulties)... But retrying 9 times in quick sucession...? Generic Emails on each failure from a "no-reply" email adress? They don't email the pdf invopices when transactions go through, relying on you hunting for them... have serious issues with the password manager site now as well, they'll email when payent fails, but not when it is taken, or a refund is made, or if the refund fails. And they'll rety payment requests indefinitely, but not refund requests - no surprise there...
Anyway, I've complained to the bank now, it's only £37.44 after all... But the payment should never have been taken in the first place, or at the very least it should have been taken on the first attemp on the updated card.... I'm now stuck with a "free" service, and have paid for the "premium" service! I will have to rant at the passwo4rd provider at some point to get them to re-instate my premium version I guess, after all, I've paid for it, and there refund has failed...
OK, so I understand a bit about CPA's! That, even if my card expires, the retailer can get the new / replacement card details.. Sneaky subscription model and the "churn" of auto renewal. Costs us all millions in forgotten subscriptions. This is a bit different maybe...
So, I have an annual subscription to a password manager site, completely forgotten about it - as you do, I then started getting emails from them saying they could not take payment for my annual subscription. OK, that's because my card has expired... Fine, I was busy, and can't really afford it anyway so I'll just let them degrade me to the free version as the emails warned. I got about 8 emails, then they stopped...
By chance, I logged onto my bank account and noticed a charge of £37.44 to the company... Yep, they'd taken the money... Looked at my account, still the old expired card details on file... I phoned the bank.
The bank confirmed there had been 8 failed attempts to take the money from my expired card, then it had gone through on the 9th attempt. The transaction had posted against my old card, not my new one... The bank just said, "oh, you know, if they keep trying, it'll go through eventually", that raised some red flags. I know my way around the FCA handbook... I used to work in IT, with the banks on Payment Processing systems, I cannot imagine some code that says "If retry attemp = 9, Then OK, he's persistent, why not?"
The bank was no help. I raised a complaint, mastercard washed there hands, and so did the bank - both saying, "Oh, the computer sometimes does that" - yeah, right - that sounds like a huge flaw to me, how would you even test that outcome, infinite monkeys, with infinite typewriters?
So, I contacted the password provider. they were cool - downgraded my account and refunded me the £37.44 - said it might take 10 days to come through. Funnily enough, I never got an email saying payment had been taken, or an email saying it had been refunded. They were happy to email me saying it had failed. There was an invoice hidden deep in the account, which customer support pointed out to me.... It's not even visible in the app, you have to hunt for it in the browser, and download a pdf! Anyway....
10 days later, no money... I phoned the bank again... Oh, yes, the refund came for the original payment, but because it was for a expired card it was rejected! So - they could take money from an expired card, but not refund to it.... Again the bank and Mastercard just fobbed me off saying - contact the retailer and get them to keep retrying the refund until it goes through!!! So, I'm supposed to contact this password manager site every 10 days and get them to retry the refund until it suceeds? You're having a laugh, based on it taking 9 attempts to be taken, I'll be here in 3 months time! The old card is now deleted from their site and the CPA is cancelled. I'm, not sure if they can even refund again, without the card on file.. I don't want to give them different details, if they can take payment from a card, they should be able to refund to it.
CPA's seem really shady to me, for starters, why retry 9 times, pretty sure the FCA says a reasonable number of times - assuming lack of ability to pay on failure, (I am in financial difficulties)... But retrying 9 times in quick sucession...? Generic Emails on each failure from a "no-reply" email adress? They don't email the pdf invopices when transactions go through, relying on you hunting for them... have serious issues with the password manager site now as well, they'll email when payent fails, but not when it is taken, or a refund is made, or if the refund fails. And they'll rety payment requests indefinitely, but not refund requests - no surprise there...
Anyway, I've complained to the bank now, it's only £37.44 after all... But the payment should never have been taken in the first place, or at the very least it should have been taken on the first attemp on the updated card.... I'm now stuck with a "free" service, and have paid for the "premium" service! I will have to rant at the passwo4rd provider at some point to get them to re-instate my premium version I guess, after all, I've paid for it, and there refund has failed...
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Comments
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Not true. You forgot - your fault.GeeeM said:
So, I have an annual subscription to a password manager site, completely forgotten about it......But the payment should never have been taken in the first place, or at the very least it should have been taken on the first attemp on the updated card....It's an old news - even a cancelled card doesn't stop a CPA, let alone expired.Refunds to cancelled/expired cards have to work fine - either the company or your bank is giving you runaround. Or both.MSE article:It must warn about cancelled/expired cards, but surprisingly, says nothing about this.Continuous payment authority
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A chargeback is the other option.
In my brief exposure to payment systems there was a stated desire to move CPA into a realistic alternative of DDs and whilst there were some improvements (eg card updater services) it still remains very crude in comparison.
Card payments are little more complex than many realise and it is likely there is a real reason why the payment failed 8 times and passed on the 9th beyond it being "one of those things" however finding out the difference that caused it to pass is going to be hidden in the bowels of IT and not something your average call centre agent will be exposed to.0 -
I'd just stick with the complaint, the bank will have to find your money somehow. Push for compensation too.
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Request a charge back of the accepted payment. Complain to FOS, etc etc1
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You can only chargeback a CPA after it has been cancelled. OP did not cancel.penners324 said:Request a charge back of the accepted payment. Complain to FOS, etc etcLife in the slow lane0 -
As far as I am aware only the recipient can cancel a CPA? its much worse than direct debits in that respect. Sure the customer can ask them to cancel, but they are reliant on the request being carried out.However I recall many years ago I had a company that wasnt cooperative with a CPA, and I managed to convince capital one to cancel it somehow.0
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The customer has the right in law to ask the bank.to cancel any CPA and the bank must do it.0
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As a bank can't stop CPA, it starts rejecting payments to the company or refunding them.
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Would reporting card lost stop them? or they carry over same as normal card renewal?
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