Originally Posted by
LondonElite
I suspect the credit card processes some these charges in batches, and will hit your card in the coming days. I agree, it is a bit odd.
This is not the case, a debit is applied to the card account when the merchant in this case BA presents the electronic voucher to the card issuer via their merchant acquirer. BA normally do this within 24 hours sometimes quicker depending on cut off times.
if the authorisation has dropped off, BA can submit the electronic voucher to get the funds but they are no longer guaranteed and only avAilable if there are funds on the card.
I suspect what happened here is BAs systems timed out before the authorisation could be matched up so no debit request was debited and in the event of no debit being requested the authorisation drops off.
Regrettably I suspect BA will have to reprocess the transaction, The FX is applied by Visa/MasterCard/Amex at the time the electronic voucher is processed and passed to the card so I suspect it will be at the unfavourable rate. I would suggest that proving who is at fault here would be difficult and a buyer beware when doing a large transaction in a foreign currency.