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An expensive evening out

 

The story

Marie had taken a travel card to pay for her expenses while on holiday overseas.  One evening she and her partner enjoyed a meal together, followed by five cocktails each at three different bars.  When Marie woke the following morning she discovered her travel card was missing.  She immediately cancelled the card.  However Marie’s card had been used by an unknown person to make a number of transactions, exhausting all of the funds in her Euro account, and also in her British pounds account, a total of NZD2,200.  Marie complained to the travel card company.  The travel card company offered her compensation of NZD200.  Marie declined the offer and referred her complaint to FSCL.

 

Dispute

Marie said she had kept her card and PIN safe at all times and could not understand how her card had been stolen and someone had withdrawn her money.

 

FSCL’s review

During our review of the complaint the travel card company offered Marie an additional NZD1,000.  We explained to Marie that if she did not accept the offer our investigation would continue and we would need to take into consideration her contribution, if any, to the loss.  It seemed most likely Marie was overseen entering her PIN when she bought the last drink for the evening at 2.30am and that either she did not check the card was returned to her, or the card was stolen without her noticing.  We asked Marie for more information about the circumstances of her last transaction.

 

Outcome

Marie decided to accept the settlement offered by the travel card company and the complaint was resolved.