Checks and ACH transfers query

[flex727]

@Drum God

Are you saying that your only recourse to correct an overcharge was the carbonless copy in your duplicate check register? It seems to me that there ought to be something more substantial to go on than that.

Consider WalMart. I go in and buy $10 worth of stuff and write a check. The cashier takes the check, keys in $10, puts the check through the machine to read the numbers and put WalMart’s imprint on the check. The cashier hands the check back to me and I leave with my stuff. If the cashier keys $100, the imprinter will put $100 in the amount space and instruct the cashier to dispense $90 in change. If the cashier keys $1, then $1 gets printed and the cashier is instructed to collect $9 more. All the proofing gets done at the point of sale. A dishonest cashier could retain the check and run it through the imprinter multiple times, removing $10 from the till with each run. The till balances and the customer gets hit with fraudulent charges. Always get your check back.

In your case, the error was with a credit card payment, so you couldn’t get the check back. Still, it does exist somewhere. Once the error was discovered, couldn’t you request that the credit card bank recheck the original document? Shouldn’t something be out of balance somewhere?

Other than the potential problem of bounced checks, you wouldn’t be out any money since in this case you would have a negative balance on your credit card and could request a refund (as worst case). If any creditor were to input the ACH wrong, that would show up as a credit in that account - the money doesn’t simply disappear or go into someone else’s account!

[ASAKMOTSD]

@flex727

Other than the potential problem of bounced checks, you wouldn’t be out any money since in this case you would have a negative balance on your credit card and could request a refund (as worst case). If any creditor were to input the ACH wrong, that would show up as a credit in that account - the money doesn’t simply disappear or go into someone else’s account!

Yeah, that would have worked if the credit card account was not already closed (the 8 bucks & change being the last payment on the closed account). Requesting a refund from a credit card company takes them weeks to issue a check. Been there / done that. Meanwhile, I would have been sitting on a negative $900 while BofA was keeping it “safe” for me and, of course, not paying me interest.

[flex727]

@ASAKMOTSD

Yeah, that would have worked if the credit card account was not already closed (the 8 bucks & change being the last payment on the closed account). Requesting a refund from a credit card company takes them weeks to issue a check. Been there / done that. Meanwhile, I would have been sitting on a negative $900 while BofA was keeping it “safe” for me and, of course, not paying me interest.

Yeah, that sucks. It’s definitely frustrating.