Payment Taken From Bank Account

Lovely Bloke

Hi folks,

I've just been perusing my online banking, and noticed that on the 28th April 2014 a payment of €50 was taken by "BOARDSIELIM".

I'd like to know how and why this happened please.

1. I closed the account on which I had a recurring yearly subscription in December 2012

2. You should not have kept my account details, which were associated with the closed account, once the account had closed. I would like a detailed explanation as to how and why these details were kept on file, and why they were used to remove money from my bank account in 2014.

3. I would like you to check if any payments were taken in April 2013 - if the answer is yes, then please explain that one. If the answer is no, then this is even more bizarre and worrisome.

4. I am extremely annoyed about this. It had been 16 Months since I closed my account and you should have deleted all associated information - you did not do this. Why?

5. All answers can be given here, in public, thanks.

6. Whatever has happened between myself, Staff/Admin in the past pales in comparison to this - this is you dipping into my account, unauthorised, and taking my money. You need to check your systems, you need to explain to me and everyone else why this happened, and to how many other people has it happened. This is very shoddy and I'd like a detailed explanation.

7. If closing an account does not cancel subscriptions you need to make this clear - although why you would continue to remove money from someone's bank account to use for a subscription on a closed Boards account is not entirely clear.

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Additional information.

I intend to submit a request as per this

http://www.boards.ie/content/privacy

Controlling your personal information
You may request details of personal information under Data Protection legislation which we hold about you or rectify any personal information which is incorrect or incomplete.

If you would like a copy of the information held on you please email us at hello@boards.ie. If you are a registered user please supply details of your username and email address which you supplied when registering. Please note that to protect your privacy we may require further information to verify your identity. There is an administration fee of €5 for such requests which can be paid by cheque or PayPal.

If you believe that any information we are holding on you is incorrect or incomplete, please email us as soon as possible at hello@boards.ie. We will promptly correct any information found to be incorrect.

If someone else has posted material about you on boards.ie without your permission and you would like to request that it be removed please read our guidelines at http://www.boards.ie/legal/ and then contact us at hello@boards.ie.

However, I need to ask why you are charging for a request that the DPC clearly states should be FOC.

http://www.dataprotection.ie/ViewDoc.asp?fn=/documents/rights/2d.htm&CatID=17&m=r

Under Section 3 of the Data Protection Acts, you have a right to find out, free of charge, if a person (an individual or an organisation) holds information about you. You also have a right to be given a description of the information and to be told the purpose(s) for holding your information.

Boards.ie: Niamh

Hi Baldy Conscience,
Thanks for bringing this to our attention. We have cancelled your recurring subscription today and sent you a payment of €102 to refund the April 2013 and April 2014 payments made to us (additional €2 is to cover any potential fee applied by Paypal to receive a payment, if it is more than this please let me know).

We are looking into this issue today and will get back to you with answers in full as soon as possible.

Thank you for your patience.

Boards.ie: Niamh

Baldy Conscience wrote: »

Hi folks,

I've just been perusing my online banking, and noticed that on the 28th April 2014 a payment of €50 was taken by "BOARDSIELIM".

I'd like to know how and why this happened please.

1. I closed the account on which I had a recurring yearly subscription in December 2012

2. You should not have kept my account details, which were associated with the closed account, once the account had closed. I would like a detailed explanation as to how and why these details were kept on file, and why they were used to remove money from my bank account in 2014.

We've never had any account details to keep, we never had them to begin with. All account details were/are on your Paypal account. When setting up a subscription, a user verifies that they want Paypal to pay Boards.ie Limited X amount per month/year; for recurring subscriptions this will continue to occur unless manually cancelled as you have seen. As I said in my post earlier today, we have now cancelled your subscription.

Baldy Conscience wrote: »

3. I would like you to check if any payments were taken in April 2013 - if the answer is yes, then please explain that one. If the answer is no, then this is even more bizarre and worrisome.

Yes a payment of €50 was taken on 27 April 2013 as the subscription was still active then. This has now been repaid to you via Paypal.

Baldy Conscience wrote: »

4. I am extremely annoyed about this. It had been 16 Months since I closed my account and you should have deleted all associated information - you did not do this. Why?

All information associated with your previous Boards.ie account has been removed. As stated in 1. above, we never had your bank account details. However Paypal continued to process the recurring subscription as it was not cancelled there. This is an oversight and something we will fix. We cannot automatically cancel subscriptions when a Boards.ie account is closed however we will endeavour to remind subscribers in a clear way to cancel their subscription via Paypal. This is already mentioned in the initial email sent when setting up a recurring subscription, however we realise that not everyone is likely to a) remember that or b) still have the email. We will also work on some other method, most likely to set up an email alert when a subscriber has closed their account so that we can check the subscription and cancel if necessary (i.e. if the user has not done so).

Baldy Conscience wrote: »

5. All answers can be given here, in public, thanks.

You’re very welcome, we’re more than happy to clear up anything like this and thanks again for bringing it to our attention.

Baldy Conscience wrote: »

6. Whatever has happened between myself, Staff/Admin in the past pales in comparison to this - this is you dipping into my account, unauthorised, and taking my money. You need to check your systems, you need to explain to me and everyone else why this happened, and to how many other people has it happened. This is very shoddy and I'd like a detailed explanation.

Your history on Boards.ie is irrelevant in this matter; there was an oversight, we have rectified it by refunding the money and we are endeavouring to ensure it doesn’t happen to any other subscribers in the future.

Baldy Conscience wrote: »

7. If closing an account does not cancel subscriptions you need to make this clear - although why you would continue to remove money from someone's bank account to use for a subscription on a closed Boards account is not entirely clear.

At the risk of repeating myself, we do not remove money from anyone’s bank account. The user sets up the recurring payment. Closing an account does not generate a message to Paypal to cancel an associated subscription; this is not currently possible with vBulletin. Due to the low volume of subscribers and even lower number who close their account this issue has not occurred in the past but now that it has, and you have highlighted it, we are aware of it and will ensure that it doesn’t happen again.

Baldy Conscience wrote: »

**************************
Additional information.

I intend to submit a request as per this

http://www.boards.ie/content/privacy



However, I need to ask why you are charging for a request that the DPC clearly states should be FOC.

http://www.dataprotection.ie/ViewDoc.asp?fn=/documents/rights/2d.htm&CatID=17&m=r

I think you have misread that or else only read the first paragraph on the page. From the first paragraph:

Under Section 3 of the Data Protection Acts, you have a right to find out, free of charge, if a person (an individual or an organisation) holds information about you. You also have a right to be given a description of the information and to be told the purpose(s) for holding your information.

The only 'free of charge' bit is finding out whether or not information on you is held by the company; we do since you have a registered account with us. From further down the same page after sample letter and above ‘Are there any exceptions to the right of access?’:

You may be asked to pay a fee, but this cannot exceed €6.35.
Once you have made your request, and paid any appropriate fee, you must be given the information within 40 days (most organisations manage to reply much sooner).

Our administration fee of €5 is in line with this.

If you have any other questions let me know here please, otherwise I trust that this is satisfactory.