laser card issue help please

renelounger

I use my laser card daily for small amounts in a few local shops. one of these shops did not batch off there sales for six months leaving me with a overdraft on my account with which i will incure fees as i did not have the facility prearranged it also ment that my direct debits went unpaid which incurs another fee. i am just wondering if i have any rights to make the shop owner pay these fees as it was a result of his bad management. I would appriciate any advice. thanks.

Neadine

renelounger wrote: »

I use my laser card daily for small amounts in a few local shops. one of these shops did not batch off there sales for six months leaving me with a overdraft on my account with which i will incure fees as i did not have the facility prearranged it also ment that my direct debits went unpaid which incurs another fee. i am just wondering if i have any rights to make the shop owner pay these fees as it was a result of his bad management. I would appriciate any advice. thanks.

How do you mean 'batch off'?
I assumed that the laser/credit card system was an automatic one? Once they processed your transaction and you entered your pin number it was a relatively automatic debit, I know it can take a day or two to appear on your statement.
I don't know exactly how the system works, but I know their swipe machine things are hooked up to a phone line, which I assume dials up a connection to the system provider/banks, how else can they confirm that your card is valid, not maxed out, etc.?

Oryx

Each retailer must also batch their transactions, which uploads them to the bank. It is separate from authorisation. I cant see why or how they could wait six months to do it though. Even a cheque only lasts that long. They would get charged exception charges and it makes no sense to risk leaving them on the machine. They dont get paid till they are uploaded.

renelounger

this shop has an old machine which you must batch off each day but they neglected to do so for six months there were a page and half of transactions to the one shop on my statement and im not the only one affected everyone who used there card in there in the last six months will have the same

dudara

Moved to Banking & Insurance & Pensions

dudara

efb

Surely it was your bad management not to reconcile your accounts?

Laser transactions not yet drawn down...

chris85

efb wrote: »

Surely it was your bad management not to reconcile your accounts?

Laser transactions not yet drawn down...

ah now but six months is a joke in fairness. lets not do the usual boards thing and jump at the OP and blame her for this.

The shop should have uploaded their payments within a few days like every other shop. I would be well pissed in this situation.

AlwaysAmber

6 months is taken the **** alright.

I would talk to the shop first and explain about the extra charges on your account. I think unless it's a really small trader they should be willing at least to split the charges with you, or maybe they have a very good reason for the delay.

If you get no joy from them, you could casually mention that merchants are expected to complete card transactions within a specified time period (I think it's 28 days, but I might be wrong). Failing to submit the transactions within the required time frame is grounds for a chargeback.

I'm not suggesting that you should do a chargeback, as that's nasty and will cost the shop a small fortune. However the shop should realise and understand that lumping 6 months of charges together at once might cause some problems for customers.

efb

chris85 wrote: »

ah now but six months is a joke in fairness. lets not do the usual boards thing and jump at the OP and blame her for this.

The shop should have uploaded their payments within a few days like every other shop. I would be well pissed in this situation.

If the boards thing is being rational about it, guilty as charged

BuffyBot

They have up to 6 months to do it IIRC so I suspect you are out of luck.

dudara

BuffyBot wrote: »

They have up to 6 months to do it IIRC so I suspect you are out of luck.

Even if they have 6 months to do it, I would make a complaint to the Financial Regulator. It's unreasonable to expect private individuals to wait for 6 months for transactions to be charged.

unclebill98

dudara wrote: »

Even if they have 6 months to do it, I would make a complaint to the Financial Regulator. It's unreasonable to expect private individuals to wait for 6 months for transactions to be charged.

The FR does not regulate shops. But, if you mean why are the banks allowed 6 months then I see your point. Surely 1 month should be enough. The longest I've seen on my statements if from ATM's abroad which can take up to a week.

OP, you should be paying more attention to your bank account. I do agree its not good practice for the shop to do what they did.

A valuable lesson for you.

harr

you will have no come back from the shop at all as they have 6 months to do there laser batchs.6 months is a very long and there are not to many shops at the moment who could afford to wait 6 months to get paid.bad mangement from the shops point of view.did you not spot it on your bank statments that you were not been charged for you items?i am sure you are not the only one to get caught out from this shop,but at the end of the day it is up to you and not the shop to keep your bank account in order.say it to the shop manger and find out if this going to happen again or was it just an oversight on the shops part.

Yawns

I was getting petrol from a card pay only station. Took about 6 weeks for the guy to finally batch his machine

I had left the money there on the card anyway as I knew it would get charged. It's not that hard really. 1 + 1 = 2

So from previous posts if in my situation, if the guy didn't batch his machine for say 7 months, would I get the 1st month of fuel for free if I did a chargeback? I'm assuming they have 6 months from each individual transaction ofc

BuffyBot

I'm assuming they have 6 months from each individual transaction ofc

Yes, that's correct

Yawns

Aww I was about 4 and a half months away from free petrol

Anyways OP why not just leave the money sitting in the account?

I know during 6 weeks my petrol costs came to about €200. I made sure it stayed there. (Involved not letting the gf touch the card )

GerardKeating

BuffyBot wrote: »

Yes, that's correct

Thought that was for credit card transactions only, for debit card it's a lot shorter, days or weeks.

chris85

efb wrote: »

If the boards thing is being rational about it, guilty as charged

Yes the usual going by the book that the shop can take that long if they want. its bad form and i certaintly would not use the shop again. Some boardsies are so quick to jump at posters when if this happened to you you would be bulling to your mates about it.

efb

Or I'd keep better records!

thelongfellow

chris85 wrote: »

Some boardsies are so quick to jump at posters

Prob since most of the "loud" ones here work for these places and are still coming to terms with the fact that their share options arn't worth the paper they are printed on.

As for the OPs issue...

What kind of business can survive when they only do their end of night banking once every 6 months? I for one would steer clear of this dodgy place! Not much chance of getting your charges back from the business in question. But no harm in trying.

wmpdd3

That's mad, everywhere I worked we always batched every day. If I wasn't charged for something on laser by the end of the week, I would have thought I got away with it.

I never knew a retailer could do that.

OP I think you should approach the retailer but I doubt you will get anywhere.

chris85

thelongfellow wrote: »

Prob since most of the "loud" ones here work for these places and are still coming to terms with the fact that their share options arn't worth the paper they are printed on.

QUOTE]

True.

Dempo1

Bizarre over sight on this shops behalf, the recession obviously is not affecting them too much. I am confused on two levels however.

Batching is normally automatic at the end of each days trading, theres noway around this on most machines. Some businesses may nominate to batch weekly or Bi weekly but 6 months is streching it a little.

You mentioned these transactions did not hit your account and this is also bizarre because as explained in another post, authorization is a separate issue, once this happens the amount is taken off your balance at account level. For example in all my dealings with laser card transactions, i have noticed that whilst the transaction may not be detailed on your statement (say on line banking), the funds "Available" will be reflected, in other words your balance may not reflect the actual transaction but your available funds will. Basically every time you use your laser card and the sale is authorised, hey presto the sale amount comes off your balance.

I'm afraid better reconciliation of your account and use of laser card is required and i doubt you have a leg to stand on with the bank.

Yawns

Dempo aib works like that alright, but I remember my BoI taking a few days for even the funds available to adjust themselves.

There's plenty of machines out there that have to be manually batched at the end of the day or whenever you choose to do it. Most places do it as part of their closing up procedures etc.

Even at that when I wasn't being charged for fuel that was on an aib card and the funds were available. I'd imgaine it's prob down to the machine not auto processing it and anywhere else I use it, it does.

Dempo1

Yawns wrote: »

Dempo aib works like that alright, but I remember my BoI taking a few days for even the funds available to adjust themselves.

There's plenty of machines out there that have to be manually batched at the end of the day or whenever you choose to do it. Most places do it as part of their closing up procedures etc.

Even at that when I wasn't being charged for fuel that was on an aib card and the funds were available. I'd imgaine it's prob down to the machine not auto processing it and anywhere else I use it, it does.

Hi Yawns, I agree re AIB and I am with NIB. When laser cards came out originally there was initial conflicts with transactions as say ATM's. Customers could go and spend say €100 in a shop, perhaps clear their balance, go out to the atm and still withdraw €100. Those days are long gone. Whilst i can not comment on Bank of Ireland, i know that once a laser transaction has been authorised, it comes off your Available Balance in most cases. I did an online transaction this morning and just for curiousity i then logged into my online bank account and in less than a minute the transaction reflected on my balance available.

I just think its bizzare the OP did not get hit for 6 months of transactions. I am also still suprised any retail business would not batch off transaction, nightly or even weekly, vey odd indeed!

Yawns

Aye very odd that they don't. I can only imagine the owner is the sole 1 doing batching and wasn't in to close up shop for a while or soemthign like that.

I remember the days of BoI laser all right. You could swipe and then go to atm. I havn't got a BoI in last 2 years so I dunno. Only with AIB and they've always done it instantly whenever I used it.

Dempo1

Yawns wrote: »

Aye very odd that they don't. I can only imagine the owner is the sole 1 doing batching and wasn't in to close up shop for a while or soemthign like that.

I remember the days of BoI laser all right. You could swipe and then go to atm. I havn't got a BoI in last 2 years so I dunno. Only with AIB and they've always done it instantly whenever I used it.

Perhaps the OP might lend us his Laser Card, i culd do with 6 months credit! LOL

Toots

Yawns wrote: »

Dempo aib works like that alright, but I remember my BoI taking a few days for even the funds available to adjust themselves.

There's plenty of machines out there that have to be manually batched at the end of the day or whenever you choose to do it. Most places do it as part of their closing up procedures etc.

Even at that when I wasn't being charged for fuel that was on an aib card and the funds were available. I'd imgaine it's prob down to the machine not auto processing it and anywhere else I use it, it does.

AFAIK the BOI laser system only went 'live' a couple of months ago, so if the OP is with BOI these transactions would have been done before the systems were online. I wonder how it would work with the new systems though, OP, do you mind me asking which bank you use?

Boom_Bap

Dempo1 wrote: »

Whilst i can not comment on Bank of Ireland, i know that once a laser transaction has been authorised, it comes off your Available Balance in most cases. I did an online transaction this morning and just for curiousity i then logged into my online bank account and in less than a minute the transaction reflected on my balance available.

There are many different factors that affect how quickly the change in your balance is affected.

Is the POS terminal online/offline, offline meaning an End of Day batching is required, online meaning that the transaction is routed directly to your bank for authorisation
Is the POS terminal connected to the bank that issued your card.
What agreements are in place with your bank and the bank that owns the terminal
Is the balance stored on the chip on your card.....dependant on the issuer of the card
......this list can go on and on

renelounger

Toots* wrote: »

AFAIK the BOI laser system only went 'live' a couple of months ago, so if the OP is with BOI these transactions would have been done before the systems were online. I wonder how it would work with the new systems though, OP, do you mind me asking which bank you use?

i use bank of ireland but will be moving my account very shortly.

renelounger

wmpdd3 wrote: »

That's mad, everywhere I worked we always batched every day. If I wasn't charged for something on laser by the end of the week, I would have thought I got away with it.

I never knew a retailer could do that.

OP I think you should approach the retailer but I doubt you will get anywhere.

i did approach him but to no avail he said as far as he knew the money was taken from the coustemers account once it was autorised and that there was very little he could do about it