Pay at pump amount

Brought £20.02 of fuel, I’m guessing will update later with true amount, just my balance is now currently wrong.

Not sure I have read anything about the plans for this.

Screenshot_20170919-133558

So this is one of the annoying things with non-live transactions. What they’ve done is they’ve authorised £1 which will update when they actually attempt to take £20.

Unfortunately, Monzo won’t know this until the full amount is presented/requested in a day or two so can’t update the balance yet.

The only options really are either to persuade the merchants to not use this kind of transaction or to perhaps ask monzo to allow you to manually update these kinds of transactions with the correct amount though as far as im aware nothing is planned because there isn’t an obvious solution.

MW

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Non-live Transaction I’m afraid, so it will take 1-2 days to show up

Yea, I guessed as much, I guess this is where real-time ledgers are just too darn futuristic.

Just really wanted to know what options there are, as for some I could see this being an issue when they see they have more money in the account than they really do.

It’s a tricky one because for example you could have an option to tell Monzo and they would knock it off your available balance but then that could create more issues.

My suggestion for an idea would be perhaps if you use the receipt function it could use OCR to work out the amount and then knock that off the available balance.

Yes, but with that comes the issues of different layouts of receipts, OCR could easily pick up the wrong number off the receipt.

Oh definitely, to be honest I think the whole thing is a bit ridiculous anyway because these terminals must be connected to be able to authorise £1 so presumably it would be fairly simple to make them request the whole correct amount.

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The Tesco pumps near myself do this too, may be because perhaps you paid at pump, they usually do an initial charge of £1 then as said charge you the full amount later. I had the issue while using Santander and a friend of mine with Natwest, therefore it’s definitely a merchant problem. I tend to pay at kiosk to prevent this as they can charge the full amount right there. Never had it at the Kiosk but always pay-at-pump.

Perhaps they do the initial charge to stop you filling up then having your card declined?

I can’t say this for certain but it’s plausible.

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I am now in the habit of avoiding pay at pump because of the Prepay card :stuck_out_tongue:

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It is slightly annoying that it’s not taken immediately but I’ve noticed it processes significantly faster with Monzo than any other bank I have used!

With Halifax if I use pay at pump it’s often up to 4 full days before the amount is debited, I’ve never waited more than 24 hours with Monzo!

It really is, especially as they are networked anyway. With the new generation of mobile-based TIS (ticket issuing systems), pretty much every train ticket is taken live from trains moving at speed so I don’t see why a petrol pump has any excuse.

Actually I was hella surprised the other day to understand Northern Rail are able to process transactions online onboard! The instant notification made me get a warm fuzzy feeling inside that finally people are moving with the times.

London Midland on the other hand… Sometimes it’s weeks later :man_facepalming:t2:

Ooh clever. Though it doesn’t really need to try OCR… when the app spots a transaction that looks like a pre-auth (it may know anyway but could identify certain vendors, £1 transactions, etc) the app could prompt you to input the billed amount and it can reconcile it later.

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So it really depends on a variety of factors (privatisation fragmentation and all that)…

So pre-last year for the last few years all of the TOCs used a system called avantix (big blue machine) that was basically a PDA and printer with a wireless (or initially wired) pin-pad. This generally speaking wasn’t online though some pin pads had sim card slots so the transactions would be downloaded at the end of each guards shift and at some point processed.

Avantix is life expired and there are a few competing systems with wonderful names such as star, doris and envoy but basically they are all based on a smartphone with a bluetooth printer (either roll paper or credit card ticket stock). Now they are basically all mobile based its a lot easier to live authorise, it may be that the London Midland depot that serves your area hasn’t yet been upgraded.

A side note, if you’ve noticed that Arriva or any of the other TOCs now have wifi on the train its not just benevolent, it’s also so the ticket machines can function.

The money was taken sometime overnight, I was not notified of this, I would think it would be better and make me more aware whats happening on my account if I was notified when the amount changed.

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I agree. This would be a good thing.

I don’t think it would be that hard to have a notification when a presentment changes the amount of the authorisation?

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Also agree, dangerous to allow modified transactions to drift into your spending history without your knowledge.

In late 2017 Mastercard asked merchants to stop doing £1.00 preauthorisations, in particular at pay-at-pump petrol stations.

These merchants are now supposed to preauthorise the maximum value that they will allow their customers to fill up, and then reverse any difference. If the customer does not have this amount, they should decline.

For example, preauthorised £100 at the pump, and you fill up with £25, they should return £75 back to you.

If the balance is under £100, it should simply decline.

This is common practice in the EU for quite some time now.

I have found some merchants in the UK are still not complying with this rule.

I will continue to keep an eye on this, but can see several pay-at-pump merchants have already started to adopt this change, with a £99 charge instead of £1.

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How quick to debit back the £75, that’s the question.

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It must be complex for banks as Mastercard have different rules for say Pay at Pump in Canada to Malaysia!

This may not be the latest version but here is a copy of the Mastercard ADF advice from Mastercard Canada

QUOTE

Mastercard AFD rules

EUROPE

Automated Fuel Dispenser Transactions In the Europe Region, the Acquirer of a Merchant having an unattended POS Terminal at a petrol station (MCC 5542) must process POS Transactions as follows. 1. The Acquirer must submit a preauthorization message containing the maximum amount determined by the Acquirer or Merchant. 2. The Issuer’s authorization response may be for the full amount of the preauthorization or for a lesser amount determined by the Issuer. The Transaction is guaranteed up to the amount authorized by the Issuer. Approval of a lesser amount is referred to as partial amount preauthorization. The Transaction is guaranteed up to the amount authorized by the Issuer. 3. The Acquirer must inform the Issuer of the final Transaction amount via an advice message, which must be sent to the Issuer within 20 minutes of the authorization response message. 4. The Issuer must send an advice acknowledgement upon receipt of the advice message. Issuers must be able to receive advice messages and return advice acknowledgements in the preauthorization environment. 5. The Issuer must post the Transaction to the Cardholder’s Account on the basis of the advice message, rather than the preauthorization response. Support for partial amount preauthorization (as defined in item 2 above) is mandatory for Issuers and Acquirers of Maestro Cards if the Customer supports partial amount preauthorization for any other debit brand. Support of partial amount preauthorization is also required for all MasterCard Account ranges if the Customer supports partial amount preauthorization for Maestro or any other debit brand. The First Presentment/1240 message must contain the final Transaction amount in DE 4.

US REGION

In the U.S. Region, if an Issuer approves an authorization request for an automated fuel dispenser Transaction identified with MCC 5542 and CAT level 2 (an “AFD Transaction”), then within 60 minutes of the time that the authorization request message is sent, the Acquirer must send an authorization advice message advising the Issuer of the Transaction amount. If after approving an authorization request for an AFD Transaction, the Issuer places a hold on Cardholder funds in excess of USD 1, then within 60 minutes of receiving the Acquirer’s authorization advice (0120 or 0420) message, the Issuer must release any hold amount that exceeds the Transaction amount specified.

CANADA REGION

In the Canada Region, if an Issuer approves an authorization request for an automated fuel dispenser Transaction identified with MCC 5542 and CAT level 2 (an “AFD Transaction”), then, within 60 minutes of the time that the authorization request message is sent, the Acquirer must send an authorization advice message advising the Issuer of the Transaction amount. If, after approving an authorization request for an AFD Transaction, the Issuer places a hold on Cardholder funds in excess of CAD 1, then, within 60 minutes of receiving the Acquirer’s authorization advice (0120 or 0420) message, the Issuer must release any hold amount that exceeds the Transaction amount.

MALAYSIA

A Malaysia Acquirer must present MasterCard automated fuel dispenser Transactions (MCC 5542) to Malaysia Issuers within two business days of the Transaction date. Within one business day of the presentment date of an automated fuel dispenser Transaction (MCC 5542), a Malaysia Issuer must post the Transaction to the Cardholder’s account and release any hold amount exceeding the Transaction amount from the Cardholder’s Account.

USING A CANADIAN CARD IN US PAY AT PUMP
https://www.mastercard.ca/en-ca/consumers/features-benefits/travel-tips/mastercard-pay-at-pump.html

UNQUOTE

NB: sorry I could not just post a link but it is OCR of a hard copy document not from a website

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