B&B double-charged me and won't refund

lukin

I stayed in a B&B two weeks ago and I was asked for my VISA card number for pre-authorisation when I called to make the booking. This is normal so I gave the number. I was only staying for one night and I paid by cash when I checked out in the morning (the 25th Oct).
However when I checked my account the following Monday I saw that the amount had been debited via my VISA card. I have called them seven or eight times to ask for it to be refunded and they say they will but at this stage I think they have no intention of doing so. When I call they say they will get the manager to call me back and he never does.
I have a receipt with the date of the day I checked in (Friday the 24th). It doesn't say I paid by cash unfortunatley so I have no way of proving I was double-charged.
In hindsight I was silly to pay by cash after giving them my VISA number but I only did that because I was double-charged a few months previously by a guesthouse in a different location when I paid by VISA (this time I was refunded).
I am out of work at the moment so I can ill afford to take this kind of hit (€71). I am not ringing them anymore as it is a waste of time. Any advice appreciated, thanks.

dudara

Contact your credit card provider and ask about initiating a chargeback. Not having a receipt for the cash payment doesn't help though.

TheDriver

only thing in your favour is they would have taken payment with no signature or PIN which suggests they took the money without authorisation bar the pre authorisation which would be strange for accommodation.

lukin

Turns out it has been refunded. I thought it hadn't as I when I was looking for the refund I was looking for an entry under the "credit" heading in my account. I thought that's the way it normally works;appears under "debit" heading in my account and when it is re-funded it then re-appears under "credit".
After calling the bank helpdesk they told me it's a "shadow posting". It just disappears as if it was never there. The B&B still should have refunded it quicker though.

Agent J

That's nothing to do with the B&B.

When you give your debit visa card (Betting it is one of those) for a pre approval at a hotel/B&B it stays on your account for like 7/10 days. You cannot draw those funds from your account.

It's a Visa debit card issue.

lukin

Agent J wrote: »

That's nothing to do with the B&B.

When you give your debit visa card (Betting it is one of those) for a pre approval at a hotel/B&B it stays on your account for like 7/10 days. You cannot draw those funds from your account.

It's a Visa debit card issue.

I don't know about that. I have given my card for pre-approval before and the amount to be debited has not appeared on the statement. As far as I know hotels etc. only do it as a safeguard in case someone books a room and then checks out without paying.

dudara

lukin wrote: »

After calling the bank helpdesk they told me it's a "shadow posting". It just disappears as if it was never there. The B&B still should have refunded it quicker though.

That's nothing to do with the B&B. The pre-authorisation has its own lifetime usually.

GerardKeating

lukin wrote: »

I don't know about that. I have given my card for pre-approval before and the amount to be debited has not appeared on the statement. As far as I know hotels etc. only do it as a safeguard in case someone books a room and then checks out without paying.

In the past (pre-online era) you would never see these "shadow" transactions, and until a year or so ago, your online banking did not show them, now they are doing so, some (like AIB) show them in a separate screen as "pending transactions", others just mix them in with the "normal" transactions.

Some banks take 3/4 weeks for shadow auths to disappear, and even don't match the completed transaction with the "shadow" and have both on your statement for a period.

lukin

GerardKeating wrote: »

In the past (pre-online era) you would never see these "shadow" transactions, and until a year or so ago, your online banking did not show them, now they are doing so, some (like AIB) show them in a separate screen as "pending transactions", others just mix them in with the "normal" transactions.

Some banks take 3/4 weeks for shadow auths to disappear, and even don't match the completed transaction with the "shadow" and have both on your statement for a period.

Ridiculous carry-on if that is true. If somebody books a room, gives their visa card number as a pre-authorisation (which then appears on his/her statement) and then pays by cash on the morning they leave, he/she will be constantly checking his/her statement to make sure it disappears.
Best solution is to always pay by visa but in my case it was for a smallish amount so I paid by cash.
The amount appeared on my online statement along with the normal transactions; it wasn't listed as a "pending transaction" so I had no idea it was different. Probably too much trouble for them to do it (I am with Bank of Ireland).

P. Breathnach

It can happen that a pre-authorisation and a payment are not linked in the system. You might pre-authorise, say, €300 for your weekend at a hotel and, when checking out, pay your bill with the same card. That might result with the payment going from your account and €300 being "frozen". When that happens, the bank and the merchant point fingers at one another and you can never be sure who is to blame.

My strategy for avoiding such annoyances is to use a CC for pre-authorisation, even if I intend to pay with a debit card. It works for me, because I never go near maxing out my CC.