Reply To: So Virgin Money is right in not refunding cash advance charges?

[Andrew.]

NorthernLass wrote:

Nobody is disputing this, what is unclear is why Virgin regarded the transaction as eligible for levying the fee in the first place.

That will all depend on how exactly the transaction was processed and the coding used.

To give an example, MBNA wrote to me and advised me that in future I would be charged cash advance fees for “cash like” transactions such as the recent fines on my Visa Card. I knew I hadn’t paid any fines, so went on the hunt.

Turned out that a local authority car park I used regularly had been set up with the wrong transaction coding with payments taken as “parking fines” rather than “parking services”. A quick email to the relevant department at the Council, and within 48 hours I had a “thank you” reply and confirmation that they’d updated their systems.

So if the builder or the curve submit transactions that are coded as “cash like” then that’s exactly how VM should process them.

As for the reversal. It’s no different than taking cash out of your Credit Card by mistake and going immediately back into the bank to pay it back in again. The original transaction happened.