Just wandered if anybody else has had this experience?


My partner and i decided to buy both sets of parents Ipad Minis for their christmas. Ordered them on Monday along with cases and Itunes vouchers. Total cost £567 paid by debit card.


Discovered yesterday that our account was over £300 overdrawn, after discussions with out bank it turns out Apple had taken a £498 authorisation charge as well as the £567 cost of the order. We were told by Apple this would take 48 hours to be returned to our account. Bank has told us we will receive unauthorised overdraft charges for each day that the account is overdrawn.


On the FAQ section of the store it states the following....


When will my debit card be charged?

Our bank will automatically debit your account for the value of your order when the order has been placed and accepted by Apple.


When will my credit card be charged?

When you place your order, Apple request authorisation to charge the order amount from your credit card company. Once we have received approval, Apple reserve the amount on your card until all items are available and your order has shipped. Your card will be charged when your order has shipped.


As we paid by debit card and not by credit card then surely this means there shouldn't have been any authorisation charge taken at all.


Has anyone else had this issue and how are Apple at resolving it? I am genuinely quite disgusted with Apple about this and i would hope at the very minimum they would refund any charges that are accrued on our account? We have been lucky enough in that we have money in another bank account along with savings. However for other people this could have caused serious financial problems.


Thanks


Matt

I've never had a problem ordering from Apple. I normally use a credit card, but you shouldn't be charged until the items shipped.

I don't wish to be rude, but if my maths is correct you only had £765 in the account at the time. Are you sure you didn't have any other payments coming out which could have caused the account to be overdrawn?

Hi Stig

Bank confirmed that the only payments due to come off were for Apple and Apple customer service confirmed they had taken a £498 pre authorisation charge. Just seems rather excessive.

A pre-authorisation doesn't actually take any money out of your account, it just confirms money is available for the retailer to take from your account.

There wouldn't be two sets of charges in this way and it wouldn't make sense for the pre-auth figure to differ from the chargeable figure.

Something else must have gone on, e.g. you have bought more iPads than you think you've bought.

I don't know if you are right about that tbh. I know a couple of people who have booked their holiday hotels on their cards and once the pre-authorisation is taken (which for hotels is often the cost of the stay plus extra to cover room charges) have found their cards get declined elsewhere as its considered a charge.

However the charge is usually cancelled once the money is actually taken so it seems to me something has gone wrong and the pre-authorisation hasn't been cancelled before the actual charge was taken. This could either be Apples fault or the bank

i understood it as them placing a hold on the funds. if another transaction on the account happens whilst the hold is in place then if there are insufficient funds to cover the cost of both transactions, your account will effectively be in debit during this time?

why didn't they just take the cost of the two devices off the account straight away anyway