Banking....anyone ever heard of this????

[faithinkarma]

Yesterday my husband bought cigarettes at a restaurant ( yes, I know he should not smoke, but that is another thread ).

He paid the $25 charge with his ATM.

While I was checking the bank account online, I noticed a $30 charge. It appeared someone had added a $5 tip to the cigarette bill.

So husband went back to the restaurant today, armed with his copy of the receipt.

The restaurant guy denied any knowledge of the extra $5 and showed his copy of the $25 transaction as proof.

Called the bank, who said....GET THIS....when it is a restaurant bill, they automatically add 20% tip. 20% !!!! Not that I have not tipped 20%, but seems pretty presumptive of the bank to try to do so for me.

Has anyone ever heard of this before? Was the bank employee just one of those people who will say anything to get you off their case?

And what if I had only had $28 in my account?

Is it just me or have the inmates taken over the asylum????

 

[faithinkarma]

The bank said the charge would be removed in three to five days..thanks a lot.

 

[GoofItUp]

That doesn't sound right at all. I've never heard of a bank increasing a charge unless it's with service fees. I think I would call back and speak to a manager and get more information. Also, I would ask them to note that unauthorized charges are NOT to be added to any transactions.

 

[pixiemomma]

I've never heard of that. How ridiculous!

 

[Toby'sFriend]

Yes, I've heard that credit card companies will do this at restaurant and gas stations.

The first time a Restaurant runs the card for authorization, it is for the meal only. They make a guess of what the tip will be and place a hold on the account for that entire amount. Then when they get the actual charge, they adjust the amount and that is what you are billed.

I'm not surprised that debit cards work in the same manner.

 

[Serena]

Yeah, exactly like Toby's Friend said. A friend of mine took me out to dinner and that happened. She didn't have enough in her account to cover it.

 

[binny]

yikes Ive never herad of that... I wonder if thats a regional thing?


Ill be in charge of my own tipping thank you very much!

 

[buddy&wooz]

I've never heard of this. Usually we add the tip to the charge, but sometimes we pay the tip in cash. I'd be mightily ticked if an additional tip was added on.

 

[faithinkarma]

Yeah, exactly like Toby's Friend said. A friend of mine took me out to dinner and that happened. She didn't have enough in her account to cover it

OUCH !

the odd thing is that this bank has several times done the exact opposite. We have left a tip on the card and when I checked the account online, the tip was not included. Several days later the corrected amount would show up.

Maybe the bank got stuck a couple of times when people left a tip that put the total bill over their account balance?

Point of intetrest.....in my home of Quebec, the government passed a law that assumes people leave a certain percentage as tip. The waiters/waitresses have that percentage of every meal they serve added to their total income at the end of the year for tax purposes. In other words they may have to pay income tax on tip income they never received.

 

[oogieboogie]

I work for a bank and I know this for a fact: The restaurant does this, not the bank. What happens is everytime a charge goes thru, the restaurant must pay a processing charge to the credit card company.

If people decide to put the tip on the credit card instead of paying by cash, if they didn't the extra tip on the first time they swiped your card, then the restaurant would have to swipe your card again for the tip amount, which means they'll be paying double charges to the credit card company.

So instead of doing it double time, they just tack on what they think you'll pay for tips. This is common practice at most restaurants you go to. The charges will revert back to the original amount in a few days.

With the advent of internet banking where you have instant balance viewing, you have to keep in mind that on the back end, processing these charges still take a few days.

And yes, they do this also with debit cards because if you sign a receipt instead of keying your PIN then it's processed in the same way as a credit card.

If you've ever bought gasoline and swiped your card, sometimes you'll see a $1 charge one day, then a couple days later the actual charge appears.

So, in conclusion (sorry for the long post)... HAKUNA MATATA about the whole thing.

 

[Lorix2]

Yes, my OLD bank did that too. The extra charge never was deducted from the account though...it's like a hold on your money at gas stations and restaurants, even at my hair salon.

I don't do business with this bank anymore, but this wasn't the only reason...

 

[faithinkarma]

I work for a bank and I know this for a fact: The restaurant does this, not the bank.

Actually, the bank admitted they had done it. It probably differs from state to state, or even from bank to bank.

 

[jkovick]

I work in finance too and totally agree with oogieboogie.

 

[Rutt and Tuke]

I've never heard of this being done and I've never seen it done. I check my online credit card balance daily and the charges are always exactly as I made them.

 

[Hillbeans]

I'd probably look for a new bank. Any bank that moves around your money without your consent has way too much control over your funds.

 

[faithinkarma]

I work in finance too and totally agree with oogieboogie.

It is not a matter of agreeing or disagreeing, the bank, Fleet bank BTW, admitted they had done it !



And I check mine daily also, that is how I caught it so quickly, literally moments after the transaction.

 

[Rajah]

Huh, interesting. Thanks for the heads up!

 

[Manda1219]

I think that's absurb. Normally when we go out and pay with credit, we leave a cash tip in the amount WE wish to leave. For a bank to take that upon themselves and assume we are not leaving cash is ridiculous. Did the card application say anything about this?

 

[catsrule]

I never knew this either, I guess because we always pay cash when eating out. I'm glad we do now.

 

[Toby'sFriend]

I guess I don't see the big deal.
When I go to WDW I give them a credit card at check-in. They run it for an authorization and place a hold for a certain amount, usually $400 or so. When I check out I inspect the bill, and they then make the actual charge and the hold is removed within the next day or so. I don't think this is different, just a much smaller scale.

I'm still allowed to leave whatever tip I want or no tip at all and the only thing that is actually charged to my card is what I sign for.

I see the $1 gasoline charges in the "pending transaction" section of my online statement all the time. I think most of the restaurant charges are correct by the next day, I very rarely notice a discrepancy.