I made a US transaction of $579 carefully taking into consideration the exchange rate at that time. I made the purchase on 20th June at 14:52 with an exchange rate of 9.98718.
I immediately got the SMS notification that the amount I bought was R5804.88 (fair enough)
Then I see on my statement that the transaction was only processed on the 21st after the exchange rate took a tumble and now I am charged R6128.94.
After chatting to the consultants it appears that it does not matter at what exchange rate you purchase, standard bank will make the exchange rate at the time the merchant makes the process even if this is 24 hours later.
I would have thought that Standard Bank would look after their clients and honour the exchange rate bought at the time and not when the merchant decides to process it. How are we (your clients) suppose to plan on how much our item is going to cost with the volatile exchange rates if you only do the exchange calculation 24 hours after we make the transaction?
0 comments