cdwow - paynova £3 fee !!!

[partyweb]

I recently discovered two £3 fees on my CC statement. I checked with my CC company and was told these were 'cash payment fees' as the Swedish company PAYNOVA (which cdwow has recently switched to using for most of it's customer transactions) were processing my payment as if it was a cash transaction.

It seems this is only happening with cdwow.us (paying with $US) and not cdwow.com

 

[Marc]

hmm not noticed anything on mine although i always use worldpay by selecting "other credit card" instead of visa, and then just putting in Visa on the worldpay site.. i will have to check my statement, and ask cd-wow for a refund if i have any fees..

just checked and haven't had any unexpected charges on my credit card, but i always change the currency to £ during checkout to avoid Natwest's foreign currency transaction charge.

 

[partyweb]

...but i always change the currency to £ during checkout to avoid Natwest's foreign currency transaction charge.

Yeah that's the problem with paynova is you have no option to change the currency.

Cheers for the tip Marc re. 'other' cards option. I didn't think of trying that.

 

[Marc]

are you going to ask cd-wow to refund you the £3?

 

[Paul Moran]

I ordered five titles from the USA site last Friday, in dollars, using PAYNOVA.

They've all now appeared in my "paper free" on-line CC account - why are some of you still waiting for statements - as ordinary purchase transactions; no "cash" fees. (BTW, I think PAYNOVA, not CD Wow, would be responsible for refunding these.)

I've never found it cheaper to take the WorldPay sterling option instead of dollars. For example, I bought Eragon last month for $9.95, which appeared in my CC account as £5.02. The WorldPay sterling option was £5.21. But I used a Nationwide CC, which has no loading charges for foreign purchases.

 

[partyweb]

are you going to ask cd-wow to refund you the £3?

...BTW, I think PAYNOVA, not CD Wow, would be responsible for refunding these...

Yup, done it already.

I only discovered these when I investigated my card after being alerted to the dvdcrave security breach (cheers nwgarratt ). My cc company arranged for the money to be put back in my account as they tried to contact PAYNOVA but their telephone number on file was unobtainable. The cc company said it is up to PAYNOVA now to contact them and explain why they have tried to process my transactions that way.

 

[Paul Moran]

Thinking a bit more about this cash fee, I seem to recall that PAYNOVA offered 2 methods of payment. One was a "pay as you go" (type in CC details for each order) method, like WorldPay, the other was a system where you registered for a PAYNOVA account and paid money in advance into a "wallet" (I think) which could then be used for purchases without having to type in CC details again.

I didn't want anything to do with the "wallet", since that would eliminate a clear link between a PAYNOVA CC payment and an individual order. The lack of such a link put me to a lot of extra work in reclaiming my o/s DVD Soon CC payments, and I wasn't going to risk being in the same position if CD Wow went bust and I needed to rely on chargebacks again. So I used the "pay as you go" method each time.

It occurs to me that there may be another disadvantage to the "wallet" method. Payments into the "wallet" would not officially relate to a specific good or service, so might be treated as cash advances. This might happen even if you only paid in enough each time to cover one particular order.

Of course, that's just a theory, and might not apply to partyweb's situation. And in any event, I see he's already got his money back from his CC company. Good on you, mate!

 

[wildeny]

In this case, CD WOW should be also aware of this problem, because it's they who chose this company.

 

[russ123]

I had this as well though for a smaller amount. I spoke to my card company and they refunded. Apparantly paynova have to flag what type of transaction it was. They had put it down as a cash advance. I asked them to check another transaction for cdwow with paynova and on this they had correctly flagged it as a retail transaction. Not sure how often this happens and it is paynva's fault but as if cdwow need another reason to avoid 'em.

 

[Paul Moran]

Thanks for clearing that up, russ123.

I've placed 11 orders with CD Wow using PAYNOVA, with no sign of any 'cash payment fee', but I'll watch out for these in my regular (usually daily) on-line account checks.

 

[freeman89]

have you bothered contacting cd wow about it? Even though paynova takes the money and keeps it, cd wow say they are happy to refund it