Coinbase has at long last responded to complaints about its exchange debiting customers’ bank accounts, in some cases pulling their balance below zero, without first being granted express permission.
It emerged on Thursday that Coinbase – one of the leading virtual currency exchanges – was hitting customers with duplicate charges, sometimes debiting them more than 50 times for a single transaction, totalling thousands of dollars.
One user took to Reddit to vent their frustration after Coinbase proceeded to bill them five times after they purchased $300 worth of Bitcoin (BTC), Ether (ETH) and Litecoin (LTC), subsequently sending their bank account overdrawn.
“My bank account went from very comfortable to negatives balance, not to mention extra $5 charges, and overdraft fees,” the customer explained. “As a result, my rent check bounced and my bank went further into negative […]”
Coinbase addressed the issue on Twitter on Friday, noting that card issuer – and payment processor – Visa was at fault for the additional charges and that it will be working with all affected customers to ensure they receive a full refund.
2/ Over the last few months, large banks and card issuers requested that card networks change the MCC for purchases of digital currency. Visa changed the MCC for digital currency purchases to a code that allows large banks and card issuers to charge consumers additional fees.
— Coinbase 🛡️📞 (@coinbase) February 16, 2018
4/ If you have been affected by any erroneous charges associated with purchases of digital currency with credit and debit cards, we are encouraging customers to contact their bank or card issuer and ask about the charges. In addition, please contact Coinbase support.
— Coinbase 🛡️📞 (@coinbase) February 16, 2018
Visa, on the other hand, denied that it was to blame for the debacle, telling popular American news outlet CNET: “Visa has not made any systems changes that would result in the duplicate transactions that are being reported.”
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Coinbase later revealed that it has already started offsetting full refunds – though it didn’t comment on whether it will cover any subsequent penalties that may have been incurred as a result of the erroneous charges, like overdraft fees.
Card issuers and banks recently requested that the Merchant Category Code (MCC) for digital currency purchases be changed by a number of the major credit card networks.
As a result, purchases that occurred between January 22nd, 2018 and February 11th, 2018 may have been refunded and reprocessed—resulting in erroneous charges.
Some customers might experience a delay between the issuance of the new charge and the offsetting refund, but ultimately customers should only have a single charge on their statement.
Were you affected by the Coinbase debacle? Let us know over on Facebook or Twitter @TrustedReviews.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
