Debit Card Safety
Filed under
Buying Things
,
by
Alison
on
8:14 PM
3
This month's Reader's Digest has an article on debit card safety. The main idea was that debit cards don't offer the same protection as credit cards, but one thing in particular caught my eye:
Holds such as this are normal in the travel industry and common at gas stations too. The article tells of a woman who bought $22 worth of gas, but the station blocked $75. It was right before a weekend, so the block wasn't lifted until several days later. Meanwhile, she didn't have much extra money to spare.When Ann Agent of Portland, Oregon, was planning to attend a children's book publishing conference in Tulsa, Oklahoma, she booked her hotel room over the phone by debit card. She and three colleagues intended to split the bill and each pay the hotel directly at checkout time.
Two days into the conference, Agent's husband called from home to read her a letter from her bank: Her checking account was overdrawn, and she was being charged $35 a day in overdraft fees. "I thought there had to be a mistake," Agent, 45, says. "I keep close track of my account balance."
Turns out when Agent reserved the room, the hotel "blocked," or held, enough money in Agent's account to cover the entire four nights' stay, plus miscellaneous charges, amounting to $580. This blocked every available penny she had and caused her to overdraw. The charges weren't reversed until Agent returned home the following Monday. (From Reader's Digest January 2008)
