They wanted proof that I had been in contact with the company and tried to get a refund from them, and that I in fact didn't owe them money.
Ended up with months of paperwork, claims from the other party that I ordered it myself (no idea where as the website to order was gone) including printouts of Stripe with my IP address which was supposed to prove their point.
Five or six mail forms to fill out (yes _mail_ not email) over the period of months with very strict deadlines.
They must have gathered the IP address from an earlier transaction a year before that. It also did not raise any flags that the transaction was exactly one year later on the minute.
An incredible waste of my time and if I had to go through all of that again I will just let it go.
Depends on what it is. Any recurring SEPA payment I can get back up to 60 days. Separately I can block those payments. All from the app or their website, I don't need to talk to anyone.
I thought being able to get that money back, plus being able to block companies were SEPA rules. Meaning, applies to loads of countries (at least the countries with the Euro).
This depends on the credit card company but mine is very willing to charge back if I call. They find it pretty trivial.
I’ve never done anything like this with a debit card or bank though. I think the money that leaves through debit is actually gone and that’s a distinction. I know the EU is more debit focused.
The era where maestro cards were impossible to use abroad was already over ten years ago. The only thing you might need a creditcard for abroad is hotels and car rental, which you wouldn't be able to do with any kind of debit card (outside of a relatively small selection of hotels).
In the US & China, it had big maestro stickers everywhere, but it didn't work at all. Different cards, different banks; on calling the banks they said they did not even see a transaction coming in and they the cards are set for international travel (and work fine everywhere they are accepted in the EU).
And it's not for lack of trying; One time on a big slog from US -> China -> AUS, I (stupidly) brought 1 credit card and 3 maestros and my CC got cancelled (fraud); I tried literally every atm , shop in these countries and could not get $1. I had to borrow from my colleagues. This is a few years ago.
The problem is between me and the vendor, not the bank.
Usually they ask you to fill an online form and attach any evidence. After that it always felt like a call center employee decided whether to start the refund or not. If you write something smart, well researched, polite, and long, chances are that poor person will just skim through it and click “accept”.
Then on the other side the company has 30-45 days to object via their bank.
With big companies they probably think it’s not worth their time.
With small companies the bank notices about a new dispute probably go to an inbox nobody monitors.