Wash Gear Issue?

[Red Baron]

A family friend who I trust called to say that his debit card account was charged the $15.00 stop limit I set on my Wash gear program, but that he only used $2.71. Sure enough my WG report says he was only charged $2.71 but his debit card statement says he was charged $15.00.

In the past the Stop switch went bad but that isn't the case this time as I ran a report and there have been no $15.00 charges in that bay in a week or so.

Ideas? Can the WG software report a different amount that the customer's card was charged?

 

[I.B. Washincars]

That is normal now. His card will be charged correctly tomorrow. It works like a gas pump and authorizes your max and then credits the excess. I'm thinking it's because of a change in the laws no longer allowing storage of card info so it has to be verified when swiped instead of at 2:00 AM or whenever. I'm not sure I'm 100% correct, but that's the jist of it.

 

[madscientist]

yes, this happened when i upgraded my wash gear from the dial up to the latest high speed version. in the past, the card was approved right away without verification, and then the actual amount charged at the end of the day when the batch was closed. with the high speed, it authorizes on the spot. since it doesn't know what the final amount will be, it "blocks off" the max amount that you have set. while it is a pending charge with your customer's bank, it will show $15.00. when it finalizes, the correct amount will show. this will happen for all of your customers. the good side is that you will no longer accept any cards that are maxed out. people had seemed to figure out that the old system would work (for them) when they used a used up visa gift card.

 

[PaulLovesJamie]

I'm fairly sure the explanations given above are correct.
Its not just wash gear - I'm starting to get a lot of calls on this exact problem from usa technologies which is what our ShurVend uses. Due to the timing of the purchase & when books get closed, that $15 charge can sit there for 4 or 5 days - doesnt give customers a warm fuzzy.

 

[Earl Weiss]

This months issue of SSCWN has an article on this and some are posting signs notifying customers of the issue and providing the explanation listed above.

 

[MEP001]

Our setup (Hamilton D.A.N./e-Xact) pre-approves the maximum charge I have set, then charges the actual amount at the end of purchase. The pre-approval is usually cleared within a few hours. We've had a couple of calls but no real complaints, though we did have one person who used a debit card and was subsequently charged by their bank for overdraft. They had just over $15 in their account when they swiped, then the transaction itself caused a negative balance.

 

[Jeff_L]

I've ran into the same comments by customers, and what is stated above is what I found out as well. I contacted my credit card merchant and he said it is a function of the credit card company and/or bank, and not the gear you use or the clearing house. I've noticed this on my personal debit card with purchases at stores, however, it doesn't pend the max amount, it just pends what is actually being charged. Difference is, when you go to a store, the card and charge are authorized at the same time. With us, the authorization happens immediately, then the charge happens when you settle at the end of the day.

What I did to hopefully reduce the amount of calls I was getting was to change the settle batch time to 11:45pm instead of the default of 3am the next day. Doing this will cause the authentication and charge to occur on the same day. So far I haven't had anymore calls about a $15 pending in an account, and I put that in place a couple weeks ago.