Halifax Debit Card Declined

LindsayT

I was in my local Lidl yesterday where I shop often. Tapped my card, cashier said it hadn't worked and I needed to put the card in with PIN. Did that, card declined. Tried again, card declined. I knew the money was in the account and that I'd put in the right PIN.
Phoned Halifax when I got home. After going through security, the lady I spoke to said they had to make sure it was me using the card and would have to put me through to anti fraud dept.
After holding on for around 45 minutes, someone finally answered. He checked the last few transactions and asked if I recognised them, which I did. He then asked my phone number and who my energy is with, which I told him.
He said he would now take the block off the card. I asked why there was a block, he said there is so much fraud these days and they needed to know it was me using the card.
This has never happened to me before, so had trouble buying that reason/excuse as I had used the PIN. In all, I was on the phone for over an hour.
Just wondered if this has happened to anyone else with Halifax or someone else and what the outcome was or what people think?

MattMattMattUK

LindsayT said:

I was in my local Lidl yesterday where I shop often. Tapped my card, cashier said it hadn't worked and I needed to put the card in with PIN. Did that, card declined. Tried again, card declined. I knew the money was in the account and that I'd put in the right PIN.
Phoned Halifax when I got home. After going through security, the lady I spoke to said they had to make sure it was me using the card and would have to put me through to anti fraud dept.
After holding on for around 45 minutes, someone finally answered. He checked the last few transactions and asked if I recognised them, which I did. He then asked my phone number and who my energy is with, which I told him.
He said he would now take the block off the card. I asked why there was a block, he said there is so much fraud these days and they needed to know it was me using the card.
This has never happened to me before, so had trouble buying that reason/excuse as I had used the PIN. In all, I was on the phone for over an hour.
Just wondered if this has happened to anyone else with Halifax or someone else and what the outcome was or what people think?

It will have happened to lots of other people both with the Halifax and with other banks and card issuers. There will have been something that triggered a fraud flag and that needed to be followed up, the banks will then temporally block the card, far better this than the bank ignores potential fraud and allows someone's account to be emptied. 

la531983

And its a good reason why you should have multiple cards.

LindsayT

@la531983 Maybe a good reason for you. Not for me, I paid in cash and if I didn't have enough cash on me, the friend who takes me would've paid for me.

@MattMattMattUK I totally agree with the last part of your post. What I don't understand is why it flagged up as fraud when I used the PIN and it's a store I'm regularly in. I could understand if was a store I don't regularly visit. In fact last Saturday, I used the card in this same store and 2 stores in the next town. That didn't flag up. Unless it's just one of those things that have no real reasoning.

la531983

LindsayT said:

@la531983 Maybe a good reason for you. Not for me, I paid in cash and if I didn't have enough cash on me, the friend who takes me would've paid for me.

@MattMattMattUK I totally agree with the last part of your post. What I don't understand is why it flagged up as fraud when I used the PIN and it's a store I'm regularly in. I could understand if was a store I don't regularly visit. In fact last Saturday, I used the card in this same store and 2 stores in the next town. That didn't flag up. Unless it's just one of those things that have no real reasoning.

Well at least you had a backup, which was the point I was getting at.

Its still very prudent having a 2nd account somewhere anyway. We see numerous threads on here from people who have had their accounts actually fully frozen for fraud checks, and they come on here saying they have no access to any of their money for weeks.

[Deleted User]

MattMattMattUK said:

LindsayT said:

I was in my local Lidl yesterday where I shop often. Tapped my card, cashier said it hadn't worked and I needed to put the card in with PIN. Did that, card declined. Tried again, card declined. I knew the money was in the account and that I'd put in the right PIN.
Phoned Halifax when I got home. After going through security, the lady I spoke to said they had to make sure it was me using the card and would have to put me through to anti fraud dept.
After holding on for around 45 minutes, someone finally answered. He checked the last few transactions and asked if I recognised them, which I did. He then asked my phone number and who my energy is with, which I told him.
He said he would now take the block off the card. I asked why there was a block, he said there is so much fraud these days and they needed to know it was me using the card.
This has never happened to me before, so had trouble buying that reason/excuse as I had used the PIN. In all, I was on the phone for over an hour.
Just wondered if this has happened to anyone else with Halifax or someone else and what the outcome was or what people think?

It will have happened to lots of other people both with the Halifax and with other banks and card issuers. There will have been something that triggered a fraud flag and that needed to be followed up, the banks will then temporally block the card, far better this than the bank ignores potential fraud and allows someone's account to be emptied. 

No, if an unauthorised party withdraws funds then the bank still owes you the funds.
The anti-fraud measures are there to protect the bank, not you. 

dealyboy

@LindsayT said:

@la531983 Maybe a good reason for you. Not for me, I paid in cash and if I didn't have enough cash on me, the friend who takes me would've paid for me.

@MattMattMattUK I totally agree with the last part of your post. What I don't understand is why it flagged up as fraud when I used the PIN and it's a store I'm regularly in. I could understand if was a store I don't regularly visit. In fact last Saturday, I used the card in this same store and 2 stores in the next town. That didn't flag up. Unless it's just one of those things that have no real reasoning.

Hi Lindsay ... I agree with you ... I do hope we haven't got to the stage where banks are randomly blocking accounts as part of their anti-fraud measures, to me that's unacceptable.

The point made by others of having other accounts is a 'straw man' argument and is not relevant.

Organgrinder

I've had this happen to me twice. Once with Halifax where my card was blocked after trying to use it on the Argos website and subsequently instore and once where I switched my current account to Natwest who opened my account and then froze all my funds as I had failed the identity checks!! (Beggars belief they'd open an account when they suspect the holder isn't who they say they are!).

In both instances I got compensation, totalling I believe about £500 for inconvenience/embarrassment etc.

MattMattMattUK

[Deleted User] said:

MattMattMattUK said:

LindsayT said:

I was in my local Lidl yesterday where I shop often. Tapped my card, cashier said it hadn't worked and I needed to put the card in with PIN. Did that, card declined. Tried again, card declined. I knew the money was in the account and that I'd put in the right PIN.
Phoned Halifax when I got home. After going through security, the lady I spoke to said they had to make sure it was me using the card and would have to put me through to anti fraud dept.
After holding on for around 45 minutes, someone finally answered. He checked the last few transactions and asked if I recognised them, which I did. He then asked my phone number and who my energy is with, which I told him.
He said he would now take the block off the card. I asked why there was a block, he said there is so much fraud these days and they needed to know it was me using the card.
This has never happened to me before, so had trouble buying that reason/excuse as I had used the PIN. In all, I was on the phone for over an hour.
Just wondered if this has happened to anyone else with Halifax or someone else and what the outcome was or what people think?

It will have happened to lots of other people both with the Halifax and with other banks and card issuers. There will have been something that triggered a fraud flag and that needed to be followed up, the banks will then temporally block the card, far better this than the bank ignores potential fraud and allows someone's account to be emptied. 

No, if an unauthorised party withdraws funds then the bank still owes you the funds.
The anti-fraud measures are there to protect the bank, not you. 

There is not anything to say "No" to, I am not really sure what your point is? If a bank account is temporarily frozen the matter can be resolved in minutes or hours, if a bank account gets emptied by fraudsters it takes days or weeks to resolve, the former is a far easier situation to resolve than the latter. 

la531983

dealyboy said:

The point made by others of having other accounts is a 'straw man' argument and is not relevant.

Well its not really, is it? Its a prudent step to negate the possible impact of having all your money put on hold for weeks on end, which we regularly see on this forum.

MorningcoffeeIV

dealyboy said:

The point made by others of having other accounts is a 'straw man' argument and is not relevant.

You've misunderstood what 'straw man' argument means.