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I am someone who uses the pay at pump option when filling up at Tesco, on my online banking statement it will show a pre-authorisation charge of £1, then a couple of day later that charge will drop off and the full cost of the fuel debited, e.g £40
It now seems that things are about to change from reading this BBC article, Asda are starting to trial it, with other supermarkets to follow.
Instead of a £1 pre-authorisation holding amount, it will rise to £99!
Should the £99 amount not be authorised by your bank due to insufficient funds, a further check will be done and lesser amount authorised to equal the available funds you have in your account e.g if you have £40 available you will be able to take £40 of fuel.
I have a concern over this, and it is this.. if i want to fill up £40 of fuel and i have £100 available in my account, the pump will ‘hold’ £99 and not release it till 2 days later (that’s how long my bank holds pre-authorisation amounts, other banks may be shorter or longer), when that money could have been earmarked to pay direct debits the next day.. to which as this money is now on hold, the direct debit is likely to fail and i will incur bank charges and admin charges.
If the pumps can do a secondary check to see what is the actual amount in your bank account and authorise that exact amount, why not make that the primary and only check? That way there would be no holding of excessive amounts of money not earmarked for the pump.
If this trial is successful and rolled out nationwide, I for one will be joining the queues and paying at the kiosk, which will mean longer queues at the pumps unfortunately.
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Maybe a bit of an over-reaction in reporting (as ever), due to a ‘failure’ of the pre-payment reversal, which appears to have affected just one customer from the 3-site Asda trial.
The pre-authorisation of the £99 is dealt with by the card issuer, not the fuel supplier; with the balance being ‘reversed’ after the fuel dispensing monetary transaction is complete, and should normally be within two minutes.
Due to mobility difficulties, I prefer the ‘pay-at-the-pump’ method; and if it’s rolled out nationally, then everyone will be affected (or not) as everyone else. Like all credit/ debit card transactions, you ‘hope’ they go through OK – unless you’re with the TSB for example.
Technology strikes again.
Hi Trev and TonyD
Why pay at pump when it can all go wrong, pay in shop at a till with a human, shouldn’t go wrong then!
I never pay at pump, having had a problem some years ago, with a Tesco pump that took money but did not give fuel, decided then never to use that system again.
lightbodyae55
I’ve used a cashpoint that never gave me any money – but I still use them.
So far, it’s been a one-off, and all got sorted out OK.
Well that was quick, the £99 pre-authorisation charge has been scrapped by Asda.
Mota History - Nissan QashqaiSeat Leon ST Mazda CX-5 Hi Trev
Another Asda cock up nothing unusual there then.
Wonder what will happen when Sainsbury’s and Asda become one hypermarket, more of the same problems!
lightbodyae55
Asdabury’s…. sounds like a forbidden fruit! lol
Mota History - Nissan QashqaiSeat Leon ST Mazda CX-5 Your protest has been heard Trev:
Nice to know the forum audience extends to the executive offices of Asda lol
They’ll be making a title sponsorship bid for the forum next… “For all your motability fuel needs, head to an Asda forecourt near you” pmsl
Mota History - Nissan QashqaiSeat Leon ST Mazda CX-5 Just read upwards, you already posted that it had been scrapped. Glad to see I have lost none of my speed.
Why do they need such a pre-authorisation method? Instead of filling-up and then paying (or driving off), why not reverse the process?
Why not just put your card in the machine, key in the maximum value of fuel you require (and can pay for), that gets authorised and deducted from your account, you then fill up to either (a) when your maximum value is reached [and then the pump stops], or (b) when your tank is full.
If the latter, then a refund is made to the card.
That’s exactly what you do in many countries at the pumps, you select the amount via set buttons for say 10,20,30,50 or fill to the brim then pay. Simple and saves you trying to fill to the exact drop for £10, just pump till it goes click.
In the USA it gets complicated, you generally have to pay up front, either at the kiosk or at the pump with a card (or cash) then get the amount of fuel you prepaid. Complicated because its not always easy to judge how much it costs to fill up (especially when trying to return a hire car with full fuel).
Now, another issue at the pump is the deactivated auto-fill switch. Activate it, so we can insert nozzle, flick the wee toggle at the bottom of the handle and wait for it to click off, no need to hold the trigger while it fills up. Especially when its either covered in diesel or freezing cold.
In life, it's not who you know that's important, it's how your wife found out.
Abercol, I’ve seen on the Tesco pumps you can preselect the cost of fuel you want but not really looked at the instructions to how it works. There are definitely those 10,20,etc buttons on there.
I wasn’t aware there was an auto-fill switch, I’ll look out for that next time, but yeah i wonder why they don’t switch them on then.
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