Something that still boggles me.
May. 25th, 2008 12:01 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ffuturesI paid my last mastercard bill in cash, in full, and in a branch of the issuing bank (NatWest) on 1st May. Payment was due on the 5th. When I got my next statement they'd charged me a late payment fee and interest; my payment was shown as received on 6th May.
I phoned and queried this, and after a lot of hassle they agreed to refund the charge (though I forgot to ask about interest, and I'm waiting to see if they refund it - if not they will be hearing from me again); their version of this is that they can't guarantee that it will take less than five working days for payment to travel from the bank to their computers and for the amount to be credited. And there was a weekend and a bank holiday in between.
Does anyone else think it odd that they can remove cash from my account in a few seconds, but it takes nearly a week for the electrons to travel from the cashier's computer to theirs - which should be a completely automatic process? Do they shunt into sidings on weekends and public holidays?
It's a couple of weeks till I get the next statement, and if it isn't sorted in full I think that the Banking Ombudsman will be my next port of call. The amount is fairly trivial, the principle isn't.
I phoned and queried this, and after a lot of hassle they agreed to refund the charge (though I forgot to ask about interest, and I'm waiting to see if they refund it - if not they will be hearing from me again); their version of this is that they can't guarantee that it will take less than five working days for payment to travel from the bank to their computers and for the amount to be credited. And there was a weekend and a bank holiday in between.
Does anyone else think it odd that they can remove cash from my account in a few seconds, but it takes nearly a week for the electrons to travel from the cashier's computer to theirs - which should be a completely automatic process? Do they shunt into sidings on weekends and public holidays?
It's a couple of weeks till I get the next statement, and if it isn't sorted in full I think that the Banking Ombudsman will be my next port of call. The amount is fairly trivial, the principle isn't.
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no subject
Date: 2008-05-25 03:57 pm (UTC)Years ago I used to use the Bank of Montreal (not for nothing are they called "BM"). When I moved, I opened a new account at a branch in the city I moved to, and asked if they could transfer the money from my old account to the new one. No problem, they could.
Then I tried to withdraw of of that money. No luck, it was being "held" until the funds "cleared" the source. I checked, and they were already gone from my original bank account. $10,000 was untouchable for a week. When I closed my account shortly after, I made certain to tell BM this was the reason…