What to do about the big shop I may have inadvertently shoplifted!

[ImGoingUpstairsToTakeOffMyHat]

Did my big shop yesterday using a scan and shop doo-dah.

Racked up £100+ worth of goods, and went to the tills to pay. I was told scan and shop wasn’t working so I’d have to put it through again on the other tills. They also said Google pay wasn’t working and made sure I had a physical card.

Went to self scan, and it was chaos. I could hear that other customers’s payments weren’t going through and a few people had to take themselves to the cash machine or go to sort it at customer services.

Anyway I scanned all my shopping then went to pay with via contactless with my card. It asked me to insert the card and enter my pin, which I did. It took a really long time but the screen on the card machine, and also the self scan machine, displayed a green tick and said “approved”/“transaction complete”. But then suddenly the self scan screen showed up a red exclamation mark and said “Error - call for help?” With a yes and no option. However, by this point the machine had spat out a receipt, and staff members were all busy helping others, so I assumed it was just the machine glitching. Also DD was in the car and didn’t want to leave her much longer, especially as scanning the shipping took so long. I pressed no, took my receipt and left.

However, no money has left my bank. I didn’t realise until I was making a transfer this morning and noticed I had no transactions for yesterday.

I was going to go back and tell them but DH said that they may make me pay, only to find that the payment is just taking a few days - so says I’d risk a double payment and may struggle to get a refund on one of them. I tried calling the customer services today but was on hold for ages and we had plans. I don’t want to go into the supermarket and ask for advice in case they accuse me of shoplifting, or force me to pay (see concern above about potential double payment )

The receipt says “Total paid £102.34”. Just for clarification. It’s not the kind of receipt you get when a transaction fails.

Should I worry about this? Is it shoplifting? Has anyone experienced this before? I don’t know much about banking, can transactions take a number of days?

Move on with your life. Its not a big deal, you have the receipt saying it is paid so there isnt much more you need to do

Something similar happened to me a few months ago. Took 4 days for it to show on my bank account. I would just leave it.

We had a similar thing with an online shop once. All delivered, email receipt etc but no money left my account until a few days later. Technical issues.

Just be aware the merchant has 6 months to collect the payment so if the receipt shows as successful it could come out when you don't expect.

I wouldn’t do anything, it’s not your fault, it’s given you a receipt. You’ve not inadvertently shoplifted, when as far as your concerned you paid, your DP is right, it may take a few days to show up especially if they were having technical difficulties.

Op I wouldn’t bother trying to sort it. Large supermarket chains are making between £500mill and £1.5bill in profit a year. It’s not your fault - they should sort out the tech issues. I agree with pp, take the win….

Wait a few days to see if the funds go out, and if not, donate the amount you would have paid to charity (assuming you are not in a poverty situation yourself)
In case you don’t have a charity close to your heart

Leave it. Enjoy the food.
If you didn’t pay, it should taste better 🤭

Im with you on this. The payment might come out in a couple of days and even if it doesnt they will probably not believe what happened and try to accuse you of something.

I had a similar thing at a shop a while back. Was for much less though about £30. The card machine was taking ages and the lady said its fine just go.

The money never came out and I went back to try to explain and got accused of all sorts of stuff.

Its not your fault and you have a receipt that says paid.

Happened to me when contactless went down.in Morrisons but you could use chip and pin. It wasn't showing in my pensing payments. Bank and Morrisons clueless then it came out after a week. Just make sure you've got the money in your account to pay for it when it does come out.

My supermarket transactions show up on my bank statement about 3 days after I shopped. If this was only yesterday and you have a receipt I'd hang fire for a few days.

Nothing.

you’ve got a receipt.

shop lifters walk about with hundreds of pounds of stuff and nothing happens

Surprised at the amount of people seemingly happy to steal ! I know OP hasn’t done this deliberately and not their fault etc etc, but if they know payment hasn’t gone through (accepting it could be taking its time to hit bank account) then that is stealing.

The Stacey Dooley documentary on shoplifting was quite enlightening and the attitudes of many on this thread seem to support it! Apparently people don’t think stealing is a problem if it’s coming from a big chain. Bizarre. Definitely not how I was brought up.

This-if it shows you've paid, it's fine. If not, I'd go back, taking the receipt. They presumably can't accuse people of shoplifting if they've got a receipt and have made the effort to go in.

It’s not stealing.
she paid, she has a receipt

You’ve got a receipt that says paid. You’ve paid. You can’t be expected to check your bank every time you make a card payment. Their problem if payment hasn’t gone through. Supermarkets are making hundreds of millions, billions perhaps in profits. Not your problem.

There is nothing to be gained by following this up. If this company is losing money because their till system is fucked the onus is on them
to sort it.

You did your level best to pay. None of this was your fault. Enjoy the free food.

Cannot believe people would go to the trouble of ensuring a supermarket is paid for pennies (ever, but especially with the daylight robbery and record profits now!)

I had this with my mum (cognitive issues) and she couldn’t remember exactly what had happened in the shop. I checked her bank account and no payment had gone out so we went back to confess and try to pay. They said not to worry about it (probably too much hassle to fix!) but it turned out that the payment went through the next day anyway - so if I were you I’d leave it for now and see if it shows up over the weekend!

Maybe not. I thought some items do raise the alarm.

Honestly, having reconciled money from PDQ machines before, chances are it will come out in the next few days. I’d give it maybe 3 days and then decide what to do.

How do you think that works then? Does the alarm magically know what's in your trolley and what went through the till???

Their problem, not yours...I often wonder if getting rid of all the checkout staff is actually costing shops more money due to increased theft etc.

thank god you took a receipt-sounds like their systems werent working probably and it will probably come out in a couplf of days