Worried that people may be left in their overdraft in the run up to Christmas, an Island Echo reader is warning fellow motorists about a new £99 fuel charge at Morrisons on the Isle of Wight.
Drivers who use the popular Pay at Pump facilities at stores in Lake and Newport are now finding that they have a bumper £99 deducted from their bank account balance, no matter how much fuel they actually put in.
The money is ‘ringfenced’ when purchasing petrol and diesel at the pump as part of the pre-authorisation process. Previously, £1 would be held from a driver’s bank account with the actual charge being deducted a few days later.
Now, £99 – the maximum amount of fuel that can be delivered from a pump – is being earmarked to ensure that forecourts aren’t left out of pocket. It is aimed at stopping those with insufficient funds from brimming the tank without the means to pay for it. On the flip side, it is hoped that customers will be able to better plan their finances as they won’t forget about the pending fuel transaction, which used to show as just £1.
It’s said that the ringfenced amount should be cleared within the hour, with the actual fuel cost deducted from the cardholder’s bank account – but many people up and down the country say this doesn’t always happen and it can be several days until the money is available again.
Earlier this year it was announced at Tesco, Morrisons, Asda and Sainsbury’s would be making the change from £1 to £99.
A concerned reader has today (Wednesday) said:
“There are no signs or anything to suggest that £99 will be taken. When I phoned Morrisons and spoke to them they said that was standard.
Article continues below this advertisement “I’m concerned that people will be thrown into their overdraft unexpectedly and may be charged for this.
“It’s a silly time of the year to introduce such a change when people are struggling to save for Christmas”.
Morrisons charged my bank account with£100 (not 99) on Friday and it wasn’t altered on my statement untill4 days later. I am a pensioner and in the next few days will be travelling north on the mainland, this will mean filling up about 3 times on the way. I usually get my petrol from Morrisons because we can usually use their café as well. At these rates it could result in £300 being deducted from my account which could well push me into being overdrawn. I will not be using Morrisons in future.
What a ridiculous idea.
Morrison CEO needs to stop this
Still waiting for the money to be returned 2 days later. No more Christmas shopping for me. What a silly rule without any warning ⚠️ I was shocked and will go inside and pay at the till. Pay at the pump sucks at Christmas .
Don’t see a problem with this at all totally understand why they have done it the person putting the fuel in wouldn’t like it if they didn’t get paid for working.
So you like paying for something you didn’t have then? You wouldn’t walk into a shop and pay for goods and walk out without taking them!
You my friend can obviously afford it – most can’t
Surely holding more money than you have actually spent, especially if it takes a few days to be cleared is tantamount to theft. Is this even legal?
It’s very simple for God’s sake. Avoid the pump that you pay at and use the pumps that you go to the till. Have never paid at the pump – never will. Better still make all the pumps pay at the till.
That’s it old timer you stay in the 18th century lol let’s all go back to cash only too.
Wow what a powerful statement . Firstly you haven’t a clue who I am and my age. Just two questions :- As an outsider what is your opinion of the human race ? Secondly what do you want to do when your grown up. Have a nice day – I will.
Its simple- DONT BUY FUEL FROM MORRISONS they will soon stop it then.
Unless things have changed, ALL the pumps that have the option of pay at pump also have the ‘Pay at the Kiosk’ option. The answer is simple as already stated, just walk into the kiosk, queue for about 5 minutes and pay over the counter. It is a stupid idea that seems to assume that we all have £100 to waste for a few days, especially those who cannot easily walk into the kiosk and have little choice but to pay at the pump! Given that many will now go into the kiosk to pay, and queues will build up, traffic will tail back and sales will drop, I wonder how quickly a compromise will be found?
I got caught out on this last week. Didn’t get it credited back for over 4 days so queried it with the bank and they said the pending transaction was showing as ‘error’ and they reported it their end to be returned. Got it back the next day. Pay at kiosk from now on people!!
Every way you turn now there’s bas**rd trying to screw us over in some way or another. This has only happened since some Yank company took over Morrisons, bloody disgrace that people have ended up out of pocket YET AGAIN thanks to others.They have already hiked the price of fuel when there has been no rise in oil prices, more greed to be copped by the poor motorist. The price of fuel at the pumps did NOT need to rise at any of the outlets.
A certain retail company have been doing it for years on the mainland, pay at pump only petrol stations with NO option to pay at a kiosk.
If you had a problem, you had to push a help button and use the intercom.
There is one in Derby. There may be even more now.
It’s the community carers and minimum wage people I worry for, not everyone has an overdraft and especially close to payday some may only have 10 or 20 pound in their account to get fuel yet with this system they can’t. They are trying to make it another rich man’s game… Fuel prices through the roof, tax prices through the roof, congestion charges everywhere, soon it will be a luxury again to drive! The only way to stop this is to continue using the staff, go in and pay with them avoid the pay at pumps. Determined to not let these elite #ssholes control every single aspect of our lives!
To add insult to injury the big Supermarkets are being criticised for increasing petrol prices when crude prices have dropped and they refuse to pass this on to the customers! So they now get hundreds of thousands of pounds from customers accounts for 3 to 4 days, earning interest, whilst scooping up millions in extra profit from crude prices! You couldn’t make this stuff up!
they are screwing the motorists by up to 16p a litre and there is nothing to stop them, they ram up the prices when costs rise but only reluctantly lower when fuel costs go down.
Perhaps we should all boycott a petrol station for a month and see how they like it, why stop at a month though.
I may have misunderstood the system but surely if you use a Visa credit card (as against a debit card) then it will simply just show as a cancelled transaction on the monthly statement (if at all).
It can only affect your bank account overdraft if you use a debit card surely?
I do use pay at pump frequently and only ever use my credit card. Personally I don’t like queuing behind people who seem intent on buying their weekly shopping along with a throw away barbecue and the cuddly toy they can’t live without.
Simple. Pay at the Kiosk. If everyone does this, Morrisons will then have to employ extra staff to cope with the extra footfall.
Not rocket science. Don’t but your fuel from Morrisons simple
I used the morrisons pay at pump on Wednesday at totton soton using my credit card, there were no signs stating the £100 authorisation had there been I would not have used as would take me over my credit limit. So end result I dispensed £8.90 petrol well within my credit limit however was shocked to find an email from card company telling me I’d gone over the limit and would be charged £12 for the privilege. Think this is illegal due to the fact of not being informed of the amount to be taken and theres no backing out once pin has been entered. Absolute disgraceful behaviour and will challenge as an unauthorised payment and will report as suc