So yesterday I made a £460 payment to a company who sells discounted gift cards. Like any transaction, I was redirected to the app to authenticate the transaction, money goes into the pending state, all seems good.
I wait for my gift card codes to come through, then 2 hours later, the merchant says “payment failed” and emailed me saying that because there was a slight error with my address, they won’t be processing. They also stated they won’t be collecting the funds and that it may stay in a pending state with my bank for up to 48 hours.
I’ve contacted Monzo, and I’ve been told that the money has a 30 day wait to receive it back? I’ve sent proof of merchant rejection via email, yet they’re still saying it will take 30 days to release the funds. They’ve told me to raise a dispute which can take 7 days before they even look at it!
I don’t see why if the merchant has stated they won’t be collecting it, Monzo has proof of that, why they can’t return or remove the “ring fence” from around my money sooner?
Monzo aren’t holding it, the merchant processor is holding it. They can release it sooner, Monzo can force this with proof, maybe they’ve deemed the proof is not enough?
The email could be forged, and therefore could mean that you run off with the money, close your account, and end up with the gift cards, and money & then Monzo have to come find you for £460 you owe them.
Take a look at it from the flip side.
If the merchant isn’t taking it, they should talk to their payment processor and get the authorisation reversed.
I’m sorry to hear your order fell through and now you have to wait for the auto-reversal date as set by MasterCard. If you have the evidence with you and would like to see if we can return the funds quicker, I’d recommend raising a dispute.
The 7 days timeframe doesn’t mean we won’t look at it before then it’s just a timeframe we’ve set incase we can’t look at it as quickly as we’d like to.
