Uber withdrew $30 from tourists for one short trip: they were left on vacation with almost no money

Douglas Ordonez was buying a cup of coffee when he noticed something was wrong with his bank account. As it turned out, Uber mistakenly charged $29 for one ride. What happened and how everything was decided, said the publication Business Insider.

Photo: IStock

“I received a notification about insufficient funds, but I knew that there was money in the account, so I tried again, but again I saw a refusal. Then I checked the bank account and saw a write-off of $29,” Ordonez said.

Ordonez was traveling to Guatemala from the US to meet his wife Dominique Adams to celebrate their 5th anniversary. She was in Costa Rica and booked an Uber ride that cost 29 Costa Rican colones, or about $994,33, according to the app. But there was an error.

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“Everything was in order, I received the receipt by email, and the next morning we both realized that in fact they took money from us in dollars,” Adams said.

Adams and Ordonez said they first tried contacting customer support at Uber and their bank, Altura Credit Union, who they said weren't very responsive and kept sending "generated messages." Meanwhile, they were unable to access their funds for several days while there was a delay and they were low on cash for the duration of the trip.

“This is the worst way to start celebrating a five-year anniversary is to sort it out and then try to enjoy everything else, knowing that there is an urgent issue that needs to be resolved as soon as possible,” Ordonez said.

“I think we both felt completely helpless,” Adams said. “Obviously it was a mistake, but it’s still shocking when you see something like that on your account, especially for that amount.”

Ordonez and Adams said they routinely charged money for Uber rides to their credit cards, but accidentally charged that ride to their debit card. Adams said credit union Altura said the payment went through despite her much lower daily limit because she filed a travel notice for their joint account for the trip.

An Uber spokesperson said: “At Uber, we take every message seriously. As soon as we received the user's report, our support team quickly resolved the issue. The write-off was applied by mistake in dollars, not in columns.

The couple said that the problem was resolved after a few days: they got their money back and paid for the Uber trip. The couple said it's unclear if Altura Credit Union or Uber resolved the issue because they've received conflicting messages from customer service teams.

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Uber previously reported that it took time to process refunds and that the speed of refunds depends on the bank's policy.

But one thing is for sure: Ordonez and Adams have said they won't be using Uber anytime soon.

“I will probably never use Uber again just knowing that their customer service is really terrible,” Adams said.

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