Declined cards

[jadam35]

As a Conductor working in Manchester I probably have around 35% of credit/debit cards declined week in week out. I just wanted to ask what do other Conductors/Train Managers do in this situation? Do you let them travel, issue an UFN or make them leave the train? This is becoming a major problem as some people use these cards on purpose, so would like to get an idea of what is happening with various TOC's..

 

[syorksdeano]

I recently had one of these when my card wouldn't work for some reason.

I was given a UFN which gave me 21 days to pay.

It was paid a few hours later after the bank had activated my new card. Nice if the bank telling me I needed to do this before using it.

Usually you get the new card and it works straight away

 

[sarahj]

Sent you a pm.

 

[Muzer]

As a Conductor working in Manchester I probably have around 35% of credit/debit cards declined week in week out. I just wanted to ask what do other Conductors/Train Managers do in this situation? Do you let them travel, issue an UFN or make them leave the train? This is becoming a major problem as some people use these cards on purpose, so would like to get an idea of what is happening with various TOC's..

The main issue is that a lot of debit cards don't support offline transactions. Alternatively, the person may have reached the limit for offline transactions without an intervening online transaction, which varies from card to card.

Unfortunately, there is often no real way to tell whether or not the card supports offline transactions. As such, many passengers will be unaware, especially if they infrequently travel, usually pay by cash or usually board at a station with issuing facilities.

However, I would expect you could do something about people who are clearly intentionally trying known bad cards. I've heard of guards phoning the banks in question to manually verify transactions, but I'm not sure if this is allowable in Northern's policy/etc.


Disclaimer: I am not a guard/rail staff/a lawyer/anyone of significance in this matter

 

[Anvil1984]

Northern have set up the Avantixs to bar a card from being swiped after a chip and pin decline.

 

[MyFriendMary]

I had a great SWT Guard who said, "I don't use that fancy chip stuff here." Me being in my rail staff uniform, "Sign here and you can keep the ticket."

Went to show me how ridiculous the online/offline thing is.

 

[WelshBluebird]

How much detail do the Avantix machines give about a card payment failure? Can a guard even tell if it is due to an issue with the machine / card reader as opposed to a problem with the card?

 

[LowLevel]

It just says 'This card has been declined. Please use an alternative card or method of payment' or words to that effect.

I'll basically swipe for anything under about £20 or so. Anything above that I'd be very reluctant. It seems a happy balance. In a lot of cases there's no time to complete a UPFN anyway so it's either the company will definitely lose the money or the company will probably get the money.

 

[sarahj]

From people i speak to, when it gets 'swiped'. It takes about a month before the money goes out.

 

[Flamingo]

If possible, when declined, I try to make an authorisation call, especially if the passenger says "You need to swipe it" and they have come from a station with facilities. A large number of passengers who tick those boxes have their cards declined by the bank as well. These usually get invited to leave at the next stop.

I rarely swipe without making a call.

 

[TheEdge]

How much detail do the Avantix machines give about a card payment failure? Can a guard even tell if it is due to an issue with the machine / card reader as opposed to a problem with the card?

I've taken to learning what cards will decline before they even use them. Blue Natwest, solid blue Barclays, stylised world HSBC, light blue Halifax, non embossed Santander, most building society cards, solid green Lloyds all decline.

On the other hand its easy to learn which cards shouldn't decline when they do. Amex should never decline, a contactless card shouldn't decline, nor should credit cards.

The card reader tends to give a slightly different message depending on the fault;

'This card has been declined. Please use an alternative card or method of payment' - tends to be the offline card issue.

'No valid chip' - obvious, tends to be someone has put a card in backwards or a broken chip, or no chip.

'Unable to read card, please reinsert card' - this is the best message to see. 99% of the time this is a card not properly inserted or can be fixed by wiping off the chip.

 

[Yew]

I've certainly been kicked off a train before when I got a new Blue National Westminster Card and didnt know that it was 'online only'


It took ages to explain to the bank that I wanted something for offline transactions, they kept thinking I meant the internet..

 

[LowLevel]

If possible, when declined, I try to make an authorisation call, especially if the passenger says "You need to swipe it" and they have come from a station with facilities. A large number of passengers who tick those boxes have their cards declined by the bank as well. These usually get invited to leave at the next stop.

I rarely swipe without making a call.

A distinct benefit of being an Intercity guard No such luck here, the next stop is usually 5 minutes away at most, maybe slightly more if you're lucky, slightly less if you're not! Phone signal is rubbish in a lot of places we go through as well.

 

[TheEdge]

A distinct benefit of being an Intercity guard No such luck here, the next stop is usually 5 minutes away at most, maybe slightly more if you're lucky, slightly less if you're not! Phone signal is rubbish in a lot of places we go through as well.

Try rural Suffolk! Not even worth it, if you've got the time to make a call you won't have any signal!

 

[island]

I've taken to learning what cards will decline before they even use them. Blue Natwest, solid blue Barclays, stylised world HSBC, light blue Halifax, non embossed Santander, most building society cards, solid green Lloyds all decline.

On the other hand its easy to learn which cards shouldn't decline when they do. Amex should never decline, a contactless card shouldn't decline, nor should credit cards.

Precisely correct. This is because the cards that you find declining are issued to customers whom the issuer does not trust to potentially go overdrawn/exceed their limit, so therefore will always require you to go online. The Avantix mobile can't go online and will decline these cards as well as the prepaid gift card type things.

Credit cards by default imply the bank trusts the cardholder, and Amex doesn't issue debit cards. It does do prepaid cards so it would be interesting to know whether one of these works.

 

[maniacmartin]

UK-issued Amex prepaid cards do not come with a chip (at least mine didn't), so it's magstripe only. I'd be very interested as well as to how an Avantix handles this

 

[LowLevel]

UK-issued Amex prepaid cards do not come with a chip (at least mine didn't), so it's magstripe only. I'd be very interested as well as to how an Avantix handles this

At my company we have a specific phone number to call for authorisation.

 

[TheEdge]

I don't think I've ever come across a pre-paid Amex, only proper ones. The only cards we are allowed to swipe now are non-UK non chipped cards. In reality this normally means US servicemen (and their families) from Mildenhall and Lakenheath.

 

[Flamingo]

A distinct benefit of being an Intercity guard No such luck here, the next stop is usually 5 minutes away at most, maybe slightly more if you're lucky, slightly less if you're not! Phone signal is rubbish in a lot of places we go through as well.

Depends on what line, not too good a signal in the Severn Tunnel!

 

[PermitToTravel]

most building society cards

Purple Nationwide decline but blue Nationwide work

 

[Haywain]

Precisely correct. This is because the cards that you find declining are issued to customers whom the issuer does not trust to potentially go overdrawn/exceed their limit, so therefore will always require you to go online. The Avantix mobile can't go online and will decline these cards as well as the prepaid gift card type things.

In defence of those getting cards declined, one of mine has been declined several times recently at stations (and would have been on trains). I was able to use it to withdraw cash from ATMs, but not to make purchases. It turned out thatthe PIN was locked, but I had no way of knowing!

 

[Flamingo]

Being declined at a station is a different issue, and nothing to do with the card off-line status.

 

[Haywain]

The point I was trying to make was that the holders of cards that are declined are not always penniless and don't always know why it is happening. The banks, apparently, don't think that it is their job to tell the card holder, but don't wish to share the information with anyone else who might tell the card holder!

 

[Bishopstone]

The point I was trying to make was that the holders of cards that are declined are not always penniless and don't always know why it is happening. The banks, apparently, don't think that it is their job to tell the card holder, but don't wish to share the information with anyone else who might tell the card holder!

My credit card was declined at York station, recently, because the issuer decided my attempted purchase of a single to Kings Cross was probably fraudulent. Of course, I had no way of knowing that was the reason for the decline, and assumed a temporary IT glitch. I paid with my debit card, instead.

Only when the card was rejected again, a few days later, did I call the issuer to discover they had frozen my account and cancelled all my regular payments (Sky etc), and no, it isn't their policy to contact customers to discuss the potential fraud: they just wait until you ring in.

So your point is well made!

 

[causton]

My credit card was declined at York station, recently, because the issuer decided my attempted purchase of a single to Kings Cross was probably fraudulent. Of course, I had no way of knowing that was the reason for the decline, and assumed a temporary IT glitch. I paid with my debit card, instead.

Only when the card was rejected again, a few days later, did I call the issuer to discover they had frozen my account and cancelled all my regular payments (Sky etc), and no, it isn't their policy to contact customers to discuss the potential fraud: they just wait until you ring in.

So your point is well made!

Odd, on Monday I bought a new phone with my card and tried to buy a top-up online for it which declined. Halifax called my home phone number every time I tried to however, and other purchases still worked (as I just went to a corner shop to buy a top-up voucher instead, defeating the purpose ) - but I could still use my card!

However Barclaycard stopped all purchases going through when someone tried to buy £800 worth of Bangladeshi phone credit on my old credit card last year - surprisingly that one wasn't actually me and I got a new card out of it!

 

[maniacmartin]

My credit card was declined at York station, recently, because the issuer decided my attempted purchase of a single to Kings Cross was probably fraudulent. Of course, I had no way of knowing that was the reason for the decline, and assumed a temporary IT glitch. I paid with my debit card, instead.

In this case though, it would have still worked in the Avantix as it doesn't contact the bank to check if they've blocked your card, unless the system is smart enough to set your offline transaction limit to £0 when you are declined at an online terminal.

 

[Muzer]

a contactless card shouldn't decline

They can if they reach their contactless and offline limits.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I've certainly been kicked off a train before when I got a new Blue National Westminster Card and didnt know that it was 'online only'


It took ages to explain to the bank that I wanted something for offline transactions, they kept thinking I meant the internet..

How did you manage it? I went into a branch, the woman insisted she'd used her blue debit card on the train and it had worked.

 

[fowler9]

I had a blue Visa Debit card from Nat West. It worked fine right across the planet, quite literally. I had to use it one day on the train when I got home. The Barclays cash machine around the corner was out of order so I just went to buy my ticket on the card in the station. The card reader there was out of order. I tried to get one on the train and for what I now know to be obvious reasons I couldn't so was told to buy a ticket at the little booth before the barrier at Lime Street. The card wouldn't work there either and I was worried now because I knew I had money in my account. The various railway staff were brilliant and let me pass through the barrier without a ticket and buy one at the ticket office where my card worked fine. Nat West never told me once that there would be any restrictions on where I could use my card, when it expired I got a new purple card which unsurprisingly enough works everywhere despite still just saying it is a Visa Debit card on it. I think the banks have a few questions to answer here! The only change I made to my account before I got the purple card was that I changed it to one with no fee..... so they gave me a more flexible card a couple of years later when the old one expired. Weird.

Just to make things weirder, when they gave me the blue card I was in a well paid job. When they later gave me the purple card I was unemployed and had had a very sketchy employment history for a couple of years.

 

[Starmill]

This thread has really made me want to know if my cards would work! I don't understand these things :/ It's just a thing in my house that we always have a few quid 'for the train' whenever we go to get on it (although now we have a card-only ticket machine things have changed a little) and I tend to pay with cash or ToD in advance of travelling in any case.

But I have a student bank account with a debit card and a student credit card that came with it (they said that passing the credit check to open the account automatically meant I'd passed it for the credit card as well, so I have it and I have used it, but do not do so as a matter of course). My debit card is the silver HSBC 'styalised world' one described by TheEdge... but if that does not work would I be in the incredibly odd situation of the credit card working but the debit card not!? Or perhaps, given that it is a student credit card with a limit so low it is basically pointless anyway, it, also, would not handle an offline transaction.

No way to find out without p*****g off a guard though unfortunately!

 

[rdeez]

Only when the card was rejected again, a few days later, did I call the issuer to discover they had frozen my account and cancelled all my regular payments (Sky etc), and no, it isn't their policy to contact customers to discuss the potential fraud: they just wait until you ring in.

So your point is well made!

That seems like poor customer service! When I tried to use my card in The Philippines (having stupidly not informed my bank in advance), it declined, but I immediately got an automated phone call from the bank detailing the attempted transaction and asking if it was genuine. The card was instantly unblocked once I verified this.