Man charged $23 quadrillion for a pack of cigarettes

Otis Driftwood · 16-07-2009 12:06pm #1

A man who was charged more than 23 quadrillion dollars on his credit card for a packet of cigarettes has said he is relieved he won't have to foot the bill. .

He had been charged a total of $23,148,855,308,184,500 (twenty-three quadrillion, one hundred forty-eight trillion, eight hundred fifty-five billion, three hundred eight million, one hundred eighty-four thousand, five hundred dollars).

"I thought somebody bought Europe with my credit card," he told the WMUR-TV station in his home town of Manchester, New Hampshire.

"It was very concerning - it was a lot of money in the negative."

Mr Muszynski said he panicked and drove back to the petrol station, where the assistant was unable to help him get to the bottom of the extortionate fee - which was greater than the world's combined GDP.

says he spent two hours on the phone with Bank of America trying to sort out the string of numbers and the overdraft charge.

The bank corrected the error the next day.

Visa has since released a statement saying: "A temporary programming error at Visa Debit Processing Services, caused some transactions to be inaccurately posted to a small number of Visa prepaid accounts.

"The technical glitch, which impacted fewer than 13,000 Visa prepaid transactions, has been corrected and erroneous postings have been removed.

"Importantly, this incident had no financial impact on Visa prepaid cardholders.

"Visa regrets any inconvenience to our customers and has taken immediate steps to ensure this error doesn't occur again."

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20090716/tod-man-charged-23-quadrillion-for-pack-870a197.html

I think the biggest laugh is that it took 2 hours on the phone to Bank of America to sort it out.

His reaction was priceless though.

"It was very concerning - it was a lot of money in the negative."

Ya dont say.

phasers · 16-07-2009 12:10pm

"I thought somebody bought Europe with my credit card,"

Who would one speak to about buying Europe?

tolosenc · 16-07-2009 12:17pm

phasers wrote: »

Who would one speak to about buying Europe?

Declan Ganley, presumably.

CutzEr · 16-07-2009 12:23pm

OBBAAAAAMAAA!!!

It's only a matter of time until the tax is increased to that amount over here

DESQ · 16-07-2009 12:24pm

If the goverment got their way they'd hike up the price above way above what that poor guy paid!!

Everythings cheaper in England!!

Pop's Diner · 16-07-2009 12:27pm

Bloody smokers. They should cost even more than that! :mad:

chughes · 16-07-2009 12:29pm

Maybe it would help to cut down on smoking if a packet of 20 was actually put up to this price. It would also help to end the recession fairly quickly. Mary Harney, please note.:D

Whosbetter? · 16-07-2009 12:31pm

Talk about 'Coughing Up'

:D

netwhizkid · 16-07-2009 12:43pm

I'd say they just accidentally put up the prices of cigarettes before the release of Bord Snip report and the next emergency budget due any day soon before the IMF takes control.

Degag · 17-07-2009 3:39am

Something similar happened before except that the person in question only found out when she got her bank statement. Everything was sorted out but she sold her bank statement on e-bay for a fairly big amount.

brendansmith · 17-07-2009 3:46am

Thats an expensive box of cigarettes!! Am I right guys? HAHAHA

Podge2k7 · 17-07-2009 3:54am

twenty-three quadrillion, one hundred forty-eight trillion, eight hundred fifty-five billion, three hundred eight million, one hundred eighty-four thousand, five hundred dollars

Jaysus

Kirby · 17-07-2009 7:34am

The funniest bit was when he started claiming that "He could never pay it back, not even his grandkids could."

Ya don't say.

The Walsho · 17-07-2009 9:34am

It'd be hilarious if he bought these when he was drunk and woke up the next morning not remembering what he'd done.

I love how he said he's glad he doesn't have to foot the bill. Literally, the world, the actual whole WORLD, couldn't foot that fúcking bill.

Biggins · 17-07-2009 9:50am

They said "Smoking Kills"
Maybe they meant it in relation to the shock heart attack bill of the buggering things!

Diabhal Beag · 17-07-2009 9:54am

I wish I had $23,148,855,308,184,500

fluffy.death · 17-07-2009 10:51am

Technical glitch or no, how the fcuk did it manage to charge him 23 quadrillion?!
Damn interns. That's why no one should let them near anything important.

Princess Consuela Bananahammock · 17-07-2009 12:09pm

What's his credit limit...? Would love to know how the transaction got oked in the first place.

mathie · 17-07-2009 12:13pm

Kirby wrote: »

The funniest bit was when he started claiming that "He could never pay it back, not even his grandkids could."

Ya don't say.

That's no way to step on the dreams of your grandkids.

'Granddad can we really be anything we want to be?'
'That's right. Anything. Except quadrillionaries'

Greenmachine · 17-07-2009 12:43pm

fluffy.death wrote: »

Technical glitch or no, how the fcuk did it manage to charge him 23 quadrillion?!
Damn interns. That's why no one should let them near anything important.

One massive mistake in the article is that it is just a copy and past. In US english a trillion is a million million (1,000,000,000,000) in UK English a Trillion is a Billion Billion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000) so it is in fact .23 trillion.

Agamemnon · 17-07-2009 1:06pm

For that kind of money, those cigs would want to be made from Heather Graham's pubes.

fluffy.death · 17-07-2009 1:10pm

Greenmachine wrote: »

One massive mistake in the article is that it is just a copy and past. In US english a trillion is a million million (1,000,000,000,000) in UK English a Trillion is a Billion Billion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000) so it is in fact .23 trillion.

Ah, well in that case then I don't see what he's complaining about!

Still would love to hear his convo with BoA, fiver says they tried to get him to agree to a repayment plan.

Resi12 · 17-07-2009 1:51pm

Imagine if he asked for cashback??

tolosenc · 17-07-2009 1:58pm

Greenmachine wrote: »

In US english a trillion is a million million (1,000,000,000,000) in UK English a Trillion is a Billion Billion 1,000,000,000,000,000,000) so it is in fact .23 trillion.

1) The short form is preferred in all variants of English, in all situations these days.

2) It would be a thousand billion (10^3 x 10^12 = 10^15)

3) I don't think I've ever heard any one say $23 billiard dollars.

Dublin_Gunner · 17-07-2009 2:08pm

If he's from the states, he should have claimed the tax back

up them Schteps · 17-07-2009 2:14pm

If that happened here, he probably would have had to pay it back because we all know the banks would just say "There's nothing we can do about it!"

Man charged $23 quadrillion for a pack of cigarettes

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