MetaChat - Why, Amazon? Why?

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08 September 2012

Why, Amazon? Why? [weird online payment scenario] →[More:]

Once again, I order something from Amazon, and they immediately snatch the payment from my checking account. No problems there.

Five days later (!), the item ships (according to the email), yet suddenly, the payment has disappeared from my bank's account activity, and I am credited the payment back. If things go as before, my account will get hit again sometime toward the middle of next week.

It all balances out in the end, but man, this makes keeping a balanced account difficult.

post by: Ardiril at: 15:22 | 7 comments

This is why I've taken to keeping my checking account ledger in a spreadsheet. That way, any time I buy something, it goes on the spreadsheet immediately, and I know how much money I have left. This has become even more useful to me ever since I started using either online bill pay systems and/or having the bank send out checks for me and those payments don't actually reach their destination till 5 to 7 days later. And if I want to buy something and I know how much it costs but I'm not going to buy it yet, I can deduct that amount from my ledger and have that amount represented to me even before I make the purchase.

posted by TrishaLynn 08 September | 15:41

For example, even though if I check my balance online it says I have $XXXX in there, I really know I only have $XX there because I have to pay off some credit card purchases, set aside part of my rent money, and a large bill needs to be paid, but the insurance company hasn't finished filing the claim. Ever since I started doing this four or five years ago, I've never gone in the red in my accounts.

posted by TrishaLynn 08 September | 15:44

My budget spreadsheet is almost 25 years old. I use a pending column and a space for my bank's available balance. When the difference between the bank's balance and my balance equals the pending sum, I know that everything is correct.

posted by Ardiril 08 September | 16:29

As far as I know, online merchants cannot legally charge you for an item until it's shipped. I wonder if the five days of non-shipping triggered some sort of internal "over the deadline" process that forced a refund until it shipped?

posted by occhiblu 09 September | 08:17

I may be the only person left on earth who keeps a paper checkbook register.

posted by ThePinkSuperhero 09 September | 18:41

I just check my bank balance like 5 or 6 times a day to see what's been deducted already versus what I know I've spent that hasn't hit yet. I suppose I'm actually keeping a lot of it in my head that way, but I've never gone over. Don't even get me started on the bf's attitude to the joint household account, which reminds me of that old fable about the pockets that were always filled with gold every time you reached into them.

posted by Twiggy 09 September | 18:58

I may be the only person left on earth who keeps a paper checkbook register.

Don't bet on it.

posted by JanetLand 10 September | 04:58

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