Barclaycard - incompetent muppets who can't cope with Xmas!!

Arrggh!!

After the fiasco when they took over Goldfish, during which they forcibly issued me with a new card (invalidating my old one) a day before I was going abroad on Holiday and when none of their new phone numbers worked so I couldn't ring them up to tell them, and with them being sneaky gits, now this!

So, last night I finalise my big Xmas shop on Amazon (details of seperate Amazon trials to come!). I sent it all off and I later get an email saying their are problems with my card. I try it again, try re-entering the details and try it again, again waiting for the refusal email everytime.

I decide to have a look at my barclaycard account online. I can see the amount for the main Amazon shop (Amazon can split these up if you use some of thier other suppliers through them - this will be important later) "pending". I check back on Amazon and see that these smaller suppliers have been paid successfully with the same card, hmm. So I ring up Barclaycard.

I explain my problem to a nice Indian Lady, who asked if the transactions in question are for other small amounts which I recognise as being for the individual items coming from a couple of "Amazon suppliers". I say no, it's the larger amount for the main shop that is not working.

She says she'll transfer to the card refusal department but gives me the direct number just in case as they are suprisingly busy!

Helpful hint: If you find yourself in the same position you can avoid all that Indian call centre palaver by ringing their fraud department directly on 01604 254 050.

Anyway, I'm put on hold for ages and I give up and ring the direct number. I get through to an automated system and choose the right option and then wait for ages again. The wait is punctuated with messages saying they had unusually high demand (I wonder why?). I eventually gave up, switched the order to my old egg card (without the cashback - boo) and went to bed.

I have now just rung the fraud people and got through quite quickly. The nice man said yes they're having lots of problems and specifically mentioned that Amazon puts some orders through as seperate items (and as coming from different companies - but he didn't say that). It's obvious to me that this clearly confuses their anti-fraud algorythms.

The bottom line is that Barclaycard can't cope with an Amazon shop from different "suppliers"!

That's just great.