Is there anything more embarrassing...
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free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 12:44 pm

than having one’s credit card declined? It happened to me this morning when I was purchasing DIY supplies from an online retailer. I couldn’t figure out what the problem was because I called my bank to verify that there were still funds in my account and nobody had cleaned out my checking account when I wasn’t looking.

Finally, the light dawned on me:

I bought gas for my car this morning and paid for it with my credit card.

Apparently gas stations/companies are permitted to put a temporary "freeze" on one's bank account/credit card to ensure payment when paying by credit card or debit card (without using your PIN).

Once the gas station receives confirmation from the bank/credit card that the transaction is approved, then the frozen funds are released and available to be withdrawn again by the account holder.

Supposedly this became common practice with gas companies following Hurricane Katrina and the record hike in oil prices earlier this year -- but that doesn't make it any less MORTIFYING when it's one's own credit card that is being declined!

The moral of this story is to always pay for gas with cash/check or debit card, but make sure you use your PIN otherwise they can still freeze the account and you can still be humiliated when you go to pay for your groceries at the supermarket.... Confused

Anyway, take this as a cautionary tale because nearly all gas stations are doing it these days – at least in TX. They claim they have to do it in order to help keep gasoline prices down because they had a rash of people pumping gas and taking off without paying for it, or using a credit card/debit account that was over its limit (or did not have funds to cover it) to pay for the fuel or just plain using stolen credit/debit cards. By freezing the credit/debit card accounts, they can ensure they get paid first before someone runs off and charges away the last few bucks in their account/credit limit by buying a Beefy Burrito Supreme at TacoBell when the munchies hit!

I was b*tching about this to a co-worker during a morning cigarette break (no lectures, please!) and lo-and-behold, she had a similar story to tell only her experience was even more discomfiting: she had bought gas with a credit card on morning and then tried to use the same credit card later that day to pay for her boss’s birthday lunch. Unfortunately for my friend, that was her only credit card so her boss ended up having to pay for both of their meals!

So now I’m wondering if this has happened to anybody else? If it hasn’t yet, chances are it will sooner or later the next time you go to gas-up your Mega-Ton SUV at the Qwikee Mart....

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 12:47 pm

Ooh, thanks for the tip! This happened to my husband once when he bought gas with his check card without using his pin. eek! Confused

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 12:50 pm

I always use it as a debit card when purchasing gas. I may have been misinformed but I thought they temporarily freeze a certain amount of funds in the account until that payment clears, just what I heard but obviously wrong.

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 12:58 pm

ariesxtreme, I thought that they did this too.... hmm

.

Either way, I myself have experienced this as well as my mom. I was shopping at Walmart and was checking out. I swipe my card.....and nothing. So, I Embarassed

and thankfully I had a check with me. Pulled that out and wrote them a check. Same thing with my mom. So now, everywhere I go, I always have some sort of 'backup' method with me, just in case.

Does everyone know that Walmart is now implementing a check system where you give them a check, it automatically withdraws that money/ see's if you have sufficient funds. They pass a check through the scanner, and thats it. You don't even have to write anything on the check. Interesting huh.... Laughing

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:02 pm

ariesxtreme wrote:

I always use it as a debit card when purchasing gas. I may have been misinformed but I thought they temporarily freeze a certain amount of funds in the account until that payment clears, just what I heard but obviously wrong.

No, they can either freeze the entire account or freeze an amount equal to the amount of transaction plus a $25/$30 "processing fee" (like they charge if you bounce a check), it's up to each gas station.

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:10 pm

i have so many credit cards, if one gets rejected, i just take out another Laughing

.

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:24 pm

skincareaddicted wrote:

i have so many credit cards, if one gets rejected, i just take out another Laughing

.

That used to be me but after getting into SERIOUS credit card debt (at one point, I had nearly 20 different credit cards) by the time I was 30, now the only “credit card” I have is my Visa Check Card. These days my motto is, “If I can’t pay cash for it, then I don’t need it.” It’s kept me out of bankruptcy court! Rolling Eyes

The credit card companies get you right as you come out of college with all those “pre-approved” offers where you don’t even have to have a job to qualify and you don’t realize how you’re being sucked in until it’s too late....

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:27 pm

girldelvov wrote:

Does everyone know that Walmart is now implementing a check system where you give them a check, it automatically withdraws that money/ see's if you have sufficient funds. They pass a check through the scanner, and thats it. You don't even have to write anything on the check. Interesting huh.... Laughing

Actually, that become federal law in Nov 2004 (or thereabouts) to prevent people from "floating" checks. It's just that most retailers didn't have the money to upgrade their systems right away to implement it but now they are finally catching up with the law so don't assume that you can write a check today and the funds will be in your account by the time it "goes through" because they've closed that loophole right up!

As someone who works for the State of TX where the employee motto is: "We get paid on the 1st, we pay bills on the 2nd, then we're broke until the 1st again," that little convenience is going to be sorely missed come the end of the month and you're out of milk and cat kibble!!

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 1:42 pm

WOW! I didn't know they could do that, only that they could hold the amount of the purchase.. Hense the scan machines, it tells them that there are funds in the account, but at that time.. I'l have to check into that here.. I don't like that one bit..

I also don't like the idea of using my pin number anywhere than the bank {and I'm not all that fond of that} To many stories of people being a distance away and using binoculars to watch you, just to name one way.. I know you can do your best to cover the machine while you're doing that, but what if you aren't successful or forget..

It's getting to the point of rediculas.. We have to take oh so many precautions than ever before, and then hope someone doesn't figure out a new way to screw us to fast.. And then we're at the mercy of the business, with cause or no cause...

Thanks for the heads up.. I hope it never happens to me, but if it does, I'll know why...

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 2:52 pm

Ugh ... I've had 2 problems with my * spam *.

1. Several years ago and my check is declined at
Walmart! Clerk says that there was a hold on my * spam *. Phoned company next day and apparently someone used my DL number on a bad check.
(So they put a hold on the DL number and not the name on the check???)

2. A few months later and my $12 check to Macy's (cosmetics counter) gets declined for same reason. Talk about embarassing. Again, my * spam * number was used.

I was so pissed ...

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 3:45 pm

I have never heard of such a thing ... is this a US thing only?

free skin care · Tue Oct 17, 2006 5:03 pm

Yeah - many times the clerk will just ASK you for your * spam * number and write that on the check. So, if someone gives an incorrect number ... oh well.

The stupid thing is that if the check is bounced - they look for the DL holder, not the person whose name and address appears on the check.

When I phoned they asked for my name. As soon as I gave it they said "wrong person - we'll release the hold on your * spam *". WTH??? By then, they KNOW the name on the license doesn't match the check.

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 5:23 am

Rjez wrote:

Yeah - many times the clerk will just ASK you for your * spam * number and write that on the check. So, if someone gives an incorrect number ... oh well.

The stupid thing is that if the check is bounced - they look for the DL holder, not the person whose name and address appears on the check.

Along the same lines: sometimes when I’m too ill with a migraine to drive to the pharmacy myself to pickup a refill of my pain meds, I’ll send my mom or my son down there to pick it up with a partially blank check made out to “Walgreens” where all s/he has to do is fill in the amount and – even though I have my DL number pre-printed on my checks – the clerk still asks her/him to show their own DL which the clerk then writes on the check. The irony is that the clerk isn’t quite observant enough to realize that the DL number pre-printed on the check doesn’t match the number of the person showing ID! Rolling Eyes

Sometimes the situation is reversed and I’ll have to pick up an Rx for my mom or grandmother using her check but show my ID – thankfully I’ve never had the collection agency come after ME because my mom’s check bounced!!

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 9:31 am

Makes you wonder how effective taking a license number can be. Rolling Eyes

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 10:05 am

This must be a strange US practice Laughing

No way in the world the card issuing companies/banks here would agree to put a person's card completely on hold at the request of a mere gas station as they would be losing business in the meantime...and those card issuers definitely want you to use their cards as often as possible.

Putting the card on hold for US50 worth of gas and then losing out on maybe a $10,000 purchase is not good business practice for the card companies.

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 10:50 am

I had a friend on a cross country trip who was staying at a different hotel every night but on the 7th night the card was declined even though the card had a high limit and he thought he had plenty of balance left. He still had 7 days left to go. Turns out every hotel he had stayed at each night placed a hold of over 400.00 on the card to cover misc. expenses, plus the hotel room, so by the last night he had over 2800.00 in holds alone, plus all hotel charges. He was out of available balance and then his mastercard charged overlimit fees. He had to wire his bank and move money into his checking and use his debit card and checks to get back home. I had the holds happen in Vegas and it took a week for them to drop off but since I was prepared ahead of time (due to my friends experience) I took a spare card in case there had been an emergency.

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 12:18 pm

AnnieR wrote:

I had a friend on a cross country trip who was staying at a different hotel every night but on the 7th night the card was declined even though the card had a high limit and he thought he had plenty of balance left. He still had 7 days left to go. Turns out every hotel he had stayed at each night placed a hold of over 400.00 on the card to cover misc. expenses, plus the hotel room, so by the last night he had over 2800.00 in holds alone, plus all hotel charges. He was out of available balance and then his mastercard charged overlimit fees. He had to wire his bank and move money into his checking and use his debit card and checks to get back home. I had the holds happen in Vegas and it took a week for them to drop off but since I was prepared ahead of time (due to my friends experience) I took a spare card in case there had been an emergency.

Holy sh*t!!! I need to tell my mom about that because she’s leaving in a couple days to take my 95+ year old grandmother on a cross-country driving trip up to New England to “see the foliage” and she was planning to take only one credit card (the one with the highest limit).

Nevermind the fact that I would rather give birth to a flaming porcupine than try to drive 3,000 miles across the country with a querulous old lady (or two! Wink

) with mild-to-moderate dementia and the onset of Alzheimers in the car who has to stop and pee every 30 minutes and who can only drive 200 miles each day because the doctors say she could develop blood clots in her legs from sitting in place too long and who throws tantrums that would make a 5-year-old cringe when she can’t get her way about eating her dessert before dinner (she’s a diabetic) and refuses to drink water or any other sort of liquid to the point where she becomes so constipated that she has such severe gas pains that she believes she is in the throes of a heart attack and forces my mother to call 911 and pay a $5000 bill each time for the Medivac helicopter every other month that isn’t covered by Medicare when in fact Gran only needs to fart or take a dump (or sometimes she even FAKES symptoms just because she’s bored and wants the paramedics and/or ER staff to fuss over her), I can’t imagine having to also be concerned with whether or not I’d have to sleep in my car with said irascible granny because my credit card got declined when I went to check into the next hotel.... Shock

(Can you tell I wouldn’t make a good geriatric nurse or nursing home attendant? Embarassed

Maybe that makes me a bad person, but I freely admit that I absolutely do not have enough patience to put up with that sort of thing and believe my mother should be nominated for sainthood and/or should receive some sort of combat hazard pay for not already having gone stark raving mad, much less be willing to take that kind of absolute insanity on a road-trip! That’s not to say that I don’t love my grandmother, I’m simply thankful that I don’t have to live with her and I’m honest enough with myself to be able to admit it. So there.)

But, I digress (again): thanks again for that warning about the hotels, Annie – I’ll be sure to pass it along to my mom so she can take a backup credit card and a wad of traveler’s checks.

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 1:13 pm

I'm sorry, but I think I love Granny!!!That's the funniest thing I've heard in a long time...has the makings of a great sitcom-you can't make up material like that!

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 1:19 pm

I thought we were the only family with relatives like that. I'll have to tell that story to my son, he has old people phobias!

free skin care · Wed Oct 18, 2006 1:35 pm

marina wrote:

That's the funniest thing I've heard in a long time...has the makings of a great sitcom-you can't make up material like that!

AnnieR wrote:

I thought we were the only family with relatives like that.

You have no idea! Just wait until I tell all y’all about my dear old Uncle Perv(ert), the Boozehound Harmonica Player.... Rolling Eyes

I keep my friends regaled with tales of my family woes during smoke-breaks at work – they actually seek me out for the latest installments. They tell me I need to write a book about the story of my life but they say I’ll need to market it as “fiction” because nobody would ever believe this sh*t really happened!

At the moment, Granny is on a hunger-strike because all she wants to eat all day, everyday, is Planter’s salted peanuts and/or MilkyWay mini candy-bars. My mother cooks her 3 meals a day and Granny just pushes the food around on her plate, waiting until one of cats jumps up on the table to sniff/sample from her plate so she has an excuse not to eat it and can make a mad-dash for the peanut jar. I keep telling my mom that if Granny insists on behaving like a 5-year-old, then she needs to be treated like one! In the immortal words of Pink Floyd, “How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat your meat?!”

I just pray that nothing happens to my mom before Granny moves on to Glory because I swear to God I’ll have to dump her in a nursing home the first thing because I won’t be able to cope.

How selfish is that?

free skin care · Thu Oct 19, 2006 6:01 am

Not selfish at all. It's as you said, she acts like a 5 yr.old, so she could live in a kindergarten for the elderly. They have meal time, playtime, recess and fingerpainting. You have your clothes arranged like Grranimals (color-coded) so you can dress yourself w/o worry. It just reminds me to be nicer to everyone as I grow old so that people will want me around.

free skin care · Thu Oct 19, 2006 7:59 am

AnnieR wrote:

I had a friend on a cross country trip who was staying at a different hotel every night but on the 7th night the card was declined even though the card had a high limit and he thought he had plenty of balance left. He still had 7 days left to go. Turns out every hotel he had stayed at each night placed a hold of over 400.00 on the card to cover misc. expenses, plus the hotel room, so by the last night he had over 2800.00 in holds alone, plus all hotel charges. He was out of available balance and then his mastercard charged overlimit fees. He had to wire his bank and move money into his checking and use his debit card and checks to get back home. I had the holds happen in Vegas and it took a week for them to drop off but since I was prepared ahead of time (due to my friends experience) I took a spare card in case there had been an emergency.

I had something similar when we moved from MI to AZ. We were driving 12 hours a day across country with just our two cars filled to the brim. We were in TX and paying for gas and my debit was declined. I panicked and called the bank. Apparently THEY put the freeze on my account because someone at the bank had tracked my purchases across the country and did it as a precaution.

I didn't realize that I should call the bank and let them know before I travel like that.

But when my credit card number was stolen, the same bank made me jump through hoops when several hundred dollars of art supplies were purchases in Mexico City (when I had never been to Mexico!).

free skin care · Thu Oct 19, 2006 3:07 pm

skincareaddicted wrote:

i have so many credit cards, if one gets rejected, i just take out another Laughing

.

I collect them! I'm so lame, I get all geeked up when I get a new one and show everyone.

Man, I feel like I haven't been here in forever....I worked 12 hours Monday Mad

. Except I was more Crying or Very sad

than

. Now I'm

, and going home!

free skin care · Thu Oct 19, 2006 3:26 pm

I havent laughed this hard in a long time.You are hilarious,it is so much better to laugh at the crap in our lives than to let it get us down.
About the money holding...did these places have a sign to alert you that funds would be held? I havent run into that problem,or should I say,yet.

Love ya Carrie !!
Linda

free skin care · Thu Oct 19, 2006 4:08 pm

As far as my friend could recall, no signs, that's why they had no clue. The hotels just stated that they were running the cards in case of extras.

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