So I'm penniless for 3 days because the machine follows blue laws?*.

The BBQ Pit
1

Or the Sabbath? Is this the 21st century or the 19th?

I had to pay up a lot of money for car repairs, no problem, I had enough to pay for almost twice that amount. But the charge machine at the dealer timed out when making the charge and the agent tried again…

This time it worked and the payment did go through, I got my car back. But I decided to call the bank to confirm if everything was ok.

The lady at the bank told me not to worry for the other charge that did show up at the system. That that charge will be dismissed on Monday because there was a charge back also in the system. So I should be able to use my card as any charges would be cleared on Monday.

Big Fucking lie.

I was treated like a criminal when at my favorite restaurant when my bank card was rejected later today.

With an empty stomach I got home and called the bank, even the supervisor at the bank told me there is nothing they can do, that even when they see that the system clearly shows the dealer’s system send a charge back that there is nothing they can do, that there is no one that can make any changes.

So the machine is set to prevent any human from doing the right thing. :dubious:

Except when it decides to take your money. The system did act to the second charge by taking money from savings, accepting the charge and just charge me for overdraft.

Of course the supervisor told me all will be cleared…

Next Monday night.(It is early Saturday night now)

Oh they understood that I was upset, but there is nothing they can do. Bullshit, even my IT workplace allows supervisors to offer free months of charge for a lost connection. Preventing me from doing anything or starving for a couple of days is of no consequence to them, a long time ago I got charges for going over the limit, but I did not complain because it was my freaking fault.

It was not my freaking fault this time.

They told me that in the end it is the fault of the dealership that I got into this temporary (I hope is temporary, I still get in a rage when I remember they told me I would have access to my card even with the charge and charge back.) but hungry mess.

Well, the dealer now told me he has the evidence they only charged me once, so no one is responsible for this…

Except a “faithful” machine somewhere?..

*A blue law is a type of law in the United States and Canada designed to enforce moral standards, particularly the observance of Sunday as a day of worship or rest. Most have been repealed, declared unconstitutional or are simply unenforced, although prohibitions on the sale of alcoholic beverages, and occasionally almost all commerce, on Sundays are still enforced in many areas.

2

Sucks, but I don’t think “Blue Laws” have anything to do with it. No moral standard being used against you here. Just the stupidity of the system.

3

Your favorite restaurant makes you pay for your food before you eat?

Is you favorite restaurant McDonald’s?

4

Chinese buffet.

Cannot find their killer pineapple shrimp anywhere else…

Damn, I’m hungry…

5

A splendid example of why I avoid debit cards.
And why I always have some money socked away for emergencies.

6

As for money socked away, the pig dies tonight!

Like it does here:

Well, actually it has a nice plug at the bottom so there is no need to break it…

7

Which Chinese buffet? I gave up looking for good ones around here; the food always seems to be cold and dry.

8

King Buffet in 7101 E McDowell Rd, Scottsdale.

However I do recommend that one only for the shrimp and other seafood. The best one for me is Crazy Buffet on 7720 S Priest Dr. in Tempe. (oysters available when in season! And good sushi)

You guys like to torture a guy in need do you?

:wink:

9

I think I know the one you’re talking about. Is that in that old brown complex on the SW corner of Scottsdale Rd and McDowell? Alas, I occasionally like shrimp if it’s done right, but I’m not a big seafood guy otherwise.

Re: Crazy Buffet: Psshh, I’m not making the trek to Tempe anytime soon with the way gas prices are :). I’ll keep it in mind though, thanks.

10

I had the same type of thing happen to me twice.

Once when I used an ATM inside a gas station. I wanted to take $40 out. The machine went through all its passes but gave me no money. The receipt even showed that there was an error and no money was given. I assume the machine was out of cash so I left.

The next day I was checking my bank online and it showed the $40 out from the machine that gave me no money. Because I had used the card at another machine it showed that $40 out as well and then a $35 overdraft charge.

I went to the bank and I explained what happened to the teller and even showed her the receipt from the ATM. Since it was not their ATM they said all I could do was wait until the vendor of the ATM goes through their balancing system and when / if the error was found they would do a charge back. I told them I had other transactions that had not even gone through yet and when they do they are also going to bounce due to the missing $40 resulting in more $35 fees.

I eventually talked to a nice lady at the main office. I faxed her a copy of the receipt from the ATM. She put the $40 back in and reversed the $35 fee. It took about a week but eventually the $40 charge back did come through and the bank took their $40 back out.

Have you tried to talk to a manager. I know that does no help right now but that is what I would suggest.

The second time was using my PayPal debit card at the vets office. He swiped it and it did nto go through. He tried three times and nothing so I ended up paying cash. I checked my Paypal account when I got home the charge had gone through. The only thing I could do was wait. Again it took about a week and when the vendor did their books the error was found and the money was put back in.

I have had to go a whole weekend once with no money so I know it sucks. I still have no idea why all the ATMs said I had no money in my account when I got paid via direct deposit on Friday and had taken cash out of my bank that same day but the next day the ATM said I had no money. My credit union is closed on Saturday so I had no access to any cash for two days. Of course come first thing Monday everything was fine. I can only guess that some type of file did not get updated. It was Friday the 13th so maybe that had something to do with it.

11

I had an ATM not dispense funds, but show that it did on my receipt. I called my bank immediately, and thankfully they immediately refunded the money. 50$ may not seem like a lot, but it was at the time. When you’re short, any sum is a lot. They informed me that if they discovered upon investigation that my claim was incorrect, I’d be re-charged the 50$. No recharge was ever made, and thank God everything was cleared up quickly and smoothly.

If that had been my only 50$ over a weekend, I’d probably have cried.

OP, I’d shove some shrimp through the modem for you, but the internet would get all sticky :frowning:

12

Any time we have to void a charge sale, we warn the customer that there will be a temporary hold placed against their account for the first amount that may take up to three days to clear, and may cause them problems if they are close to their limit. Even doing a return instead of a void won’t solve the problem, because until the two transactions are processed at closing, the banking system doesn’t know what actually transpired, and money doesn’t always get credited back to the account for a day or two. This can really cause a problem for someone who has spent money with us that may have drawn their account down close to zero…then they change their mind about the gift, want to return it (sometimes in less than 15 minutes!) and buy something else somewhere else…ain’t gonna happen, because we’ve already gotten an authorization for the first amount, and the void won’t get processed until the system polls at closing. And good luck on getting anything corrected by a Monday…my bank doesn’t clear things until Tuesday mornings…if you deposit anything over the weekend, the funds aren’t available until Tuesday. So when my son would deposit his paycheck on a Friday after work, he could only get $100 back in cash, and then the balance isn’t available until Tuesday morning…can’t use the check card, because that amount is on hold. Sucks to be poor, I tell you.

13

Don’t mean to continue the torture, but I’m adding both of those to my list next time I find myself out east.

14

If every merchant were like you it would make my life so much easier. I field a dozen calls a day from people who’ve returned something or had a transaction voided by the merchant and the merchant blithely tells them that the money is “back on their card.” Then they go to use it somewhere else and can’t because the merchant is still tying up the money prompting a call to bitch at me for taking their money.

15

Nothing to do with blue laws. Everything to do with bank greed. Banks immediately deduct your funds when a Point Of Sale transaction comes through with the logic that you have clearly spent the money even though they have no paperwork from the merchant indicating that the merchant has completed a financial transaction with you. However, when a credit is issued through the identical POS system, then the bank stands back and (self)righteously proclaims, we have no paper from the merchant indicating that a financial transaction has occurred, you’ll just have to wait until it processes. It is simply one more way for the banks to rob their patrons.

If you make an ATM withdrawal and the receipt shows that you have accidentally just gone into the red, you can immediately put the money back into the machine (or walk over to a real bank and hand the cash to a real teller) and the bank will charge you the overdraft fee of $30+ even though you were in the red for all of two minutes, because they will “hold” the cash until the next day’s business. (Sometimes you can escape that scenario if the bank will recognize up to $50 or $100 in a deposit. It depends on the bank.)

16

We started informing people how this works because we had to deal with an irate person a few years ago, who just could not understand why there was an authorization hold against her account, and called corporate to complain that we had double charged her. We hadn’t…the one authorization cleared off in a day or two when no corresponding sale posted. We really, until that point, didn’t know how it all worked. but these days, some people are checking their bank and credit card accounts daily to see what charges come through…forgetting that the sales aren’t finalized until the store closes and the registers poll, sending the information off to the great clearing-house in the sky.

We really have problems with it when we have taken a phone order and make a mistake keying it in, and have to void it out and start all over again…or as many times happens, the customer calls us, places an order…and then calls back an hour later to make a change, or cancel the sale, or tell us they gave us the wrong credit card number…that one was fun. The customer called and faxed us her credit card number, we processed the sale, got an authorization, and then she calls back to say she’d given us her personal card, not her corporate card, and she was leaving on vacation the next day, and now had no way to get the cash she needed for her trip…she ended up calling the bank and getting the hold lifted, but it could have ruined her trip. Like I said, it sucks to be poor and living on the edge of your finances.

17

The only time I’ve ever been on the red, the bank ran two payments of mine before they ran my salary coming in. That cost me a penalty of about $10, for an overdraft of less than $5 lasting a few minutes. If they’d added the salary first, why, the bank would have “lost” $10!

18

And that’s precisely why I refuse to bank at banks anymore. It seems to me that banks have very sketchy morals when it comes to policies that result in exorbitant charges in the bank’s favor, while credit unions usually do not. CU policies generally favor the shareholder and when they don’t, they are much more inclined to make exceptions to the policies on a case-by-case basis.

19

The gas stations around here do this if you use your debit card to buy gasoline at the pump. It will put a $75 hold on your account even if you only put $10 worth of gas in your tank. My nephews actually ran out of money coming home from college one time because of this. If you do use your card at the pump, I suggest you use the “credit” feature of it. But that’s just my two cents, take it for what it’s worth.

SN1P3

20

I can’t fathom why it takes the gas station at least 7 days (sometimes more) to process my $8.00 debit for gas. I feel like my bank is holding that last charge until I get close enough to overdraft and then drops it. It’s fucking uncanny!