[Android/iOS] Ordering of delayed refund

[slug56]

On Saturday, I went to Clinton Cards and bought a book of 2nd class stamps. Left the shop only to realise she’d given and charged me for a book of 1st class.

I was told the original payment (£4.02) would still go through, but she’d issue a separate refund for the same amount that would take a few days to process. I then bought what I actually wanted for £6.96 and for the next couple of days, I could see the two debits in my feed: one for £4.02 and one for £6.96.

Yesterday, the refund processed, but the transaction ordering in my feed had me completely confused. It seems like the original £4.02 payment suddenly turned into a credit and I saw a new transaction item yesterday for a £4.02 debit. What I was expecting to see was the original two transactions to remain intact and a new £4.02 refund from yesterday.

I hope I’m making sense… Here’s a picture to clarify.

[Jackcrwhitney]

Hi @slug56,

What you’re seeing is how refunds are displayed within Monzo, they come up as credits from a merchant hence the + symbol. I know there have been discussions here on the forum about clearer ways these could be marked as refunds or even be associated with the original transaction. I beilive it’s something Monzo will look at in the future once they have a few of the core features out and working.

For what ever reason the original £4 that’s been taken from your account was slow at reaching Monzo. Hence why it states delayed under the merchant name. Again this is normal for some merchants where they are a bit slow in getting what’s required across to the bank.

Does that help?

[slug56]

Hmm, sort of, thanks. I have no problem with how the refund shows - I think it makes perfect sense in green with a + symbol. I’m confused by the ordering. My transaction history has been modified as the refund is now in place of the original debit. I don’t think it was the payment that was delayed either - it should be the refund that was delayed.

Basically, just swap the “4.02” and the “+4.02” numbers around and that’s exactly how I should expect my feed to look after the refund has processed.

[Jackcrwhitney]

Ahh I see what you mean. Yes ideally they should be the other way around but since Monzo only found out about the transaction today (hence why it states it’s delayed) it goes at the top of the feed as it’s new information.
As to why the merchant only informed Monzo about it now who knows. They often process things in weird ways and not always in order.

Something similar but if a bigger scale recently happened at Tesco:

Fury as Tesco takes payments months after people shopped

I agree maybe it could be clearer though.

[slug56]

I don’t think Monzo only found out about the original £4.02 payment today - it’s been sitting in my transaction feed since the moment I made the transaction. They only found out about the refund today and that should have gone to the top of the feed and show as delayed. Instead, the refund has overwritten my existing £4.02 payment in the feed and the payment that it overwrote has now moved to the top and is incorrectly showing as delayed.

[Jackcrwhitney]

I see, thanks for explaining again. That is strange… Maybe worth speaking to in app support to see why this happened? I’ve not experienced this myself.

[bentalbot]

This is the first I heard of that! Is there not some limit like if the money is not deducted from your account within 30 days of the physical transaction it is invalid, or something? I thought I’d heard of that…

[Jackcrwhitney]

Not from what I’m aware of, the 30 day is a longer type of pre authorization which is often used by hotels etc as a deposit.

This thread / post may provide a good read for you

"Delayed from" payments

From a legal standpoint, that money was taken, and deprived me of the use of it while it was taken. Monzo is then returning me the use of that money, so i can spend it again, even though the retailer can then re-take it at a later date. In the worst case, this will cause people to think they have more money than they do, overspend, then end up in debt.

[bentalbot]

I find it quite bad that a merchant can delay taking the payment for however long they want and not even have a hold on the funds while they’re in the customer’s account so it’s clear they’re dedicated to the merchant. There really should be a limit or lots of people will unfairly go into overdrafts whenever that problem happens again.

Thanks for the link, I had skimmed over that before but gave it a better read this time

[slug56]

Hopefully this clears up what I’m trying to show:

[awjdean]

I got the same thing recently.

I bought a train ticket on Friday for £6.95 before realising that all trains from that station were cancelled due to the weather, so I went into the station and applied for a refund for my ticket.

When the refund of + £6.95 came through on the next day, the value for old feed item for the transaction made on the Friday was switched with the value for the new feed item for the refund which was made on Saturday.

All the details for the old transaction feed item (made on Friday) are the same as when the transaction was originally made are the same (ie: the time, date, name location, reference and receipt I uploaded are the same) except the value of the transaction is now + £6.95 when previously it was £6.95.

NB: the new feed item has all the expected details of the refund except the value of the transaction is £6.95 instead of + £6.95.

Timeline

• Transaction made on Friday, 8th February and refund applied for at merchant.
• Refund processed by merchant on Saturday, 9th February.
• Value for feed item for transaction is swapped with value for feed item for refund.

OS: iOS 12.1.4
Device: iPhone 6
App Version: 2.34.0 #504