I recently purchased some food from a fast food establishment and my card was declined twice and then voided a third time, I eventually asked to use another card machine and this time it worked.
Unfortunately the three times I tried have all come out as transactions, I have contacted the merchant and they have told me to show the receipts which show declined/voided to bank and this shall be refunded as they cannot do it from their end? Please can anyone advise as what I should do next to have this money refunded?
This happened to me in Tesco yesterday. I reversed the original charge (which is the one Tesco said didnât go through) in the app - hope I did the right thing!
These declines which look like charges normally get reversed by themselves within 7 days - often the same day. It doesnât happen that often but I just ignore them now when it does.
COps can reverse them straight away if you need the money available now, or there is apparently a new feature to do it yourself within the transaction in the app as @monzo2018 mentions.
Itâs an annoying problem that can happen no matter who you bank with, but for banks with instant notifications itâs 100 times more visible (with legacy banks it just shows less âAvailable balanceâ for a short period then goes back up without any transaction showing).
The problem is the card terminal will ask for the bankâs âauthorisationâ (ie. asking them âis this money available for us to take?â) and if the bank gives the authorisation (ie. âyes this money is available, go for itâ) the bank immediately holds your money (and shows a deduction on your account) even though no transaction has taken place yet - in anticipation of âpresentment (where the merchant says âyou said we can take the money and we confirm we now have, so send us the money youâve been holding from the customerââ.
If the bank authorises it but then thereâs an error anywhere in the pipes before presentment then you are going to have that transaction stuck in limbo where itâs been held by the bank but not confirmed or collected by the merchant and an error or rejection receipt on their card terminal.
I think Monzo drops the hold on the money after 7 days of no presentment (although I could be wrong). If youâre lucky the merchant themself or their software will trigger the bankâs hold on the money to be lifted in a few hours or days.
Yeah I used to get this with my previous bank in Tesco as well. Always Tesco!! (And itâs not the only supermarket I regularly shop in so itâs not just the frequency that makes it more likely for me to come across issues there.).
Happened a lot when I worked in Tesco. It was a pain in the rear. There was a help article on what to do when a customer reported it and Tesco can(or could when I worked there) reverse the issue fairly quickly but it was a help article few staff knew existed⌠they always fall off after some time just annoying that they happen in the first place
