restaurant have not charged our credit card for meal we had 6 weeks ago - did we get it for free?!

[fairylights]

Just wondering how long a business is "allowed" to take before charging the credit card company for your bill?
We had a lovely meal out as a very special treat about 6 weeks ago and spent what seemed like loads of money for us..
we paid for it on dh's credit card as it was neary pay day and we didn't have much in our current account. A few days later i paid the bill but we have just realized that the meal has never come up on dh's credit card statements and he has a "credit" balance on it! Can the restaurant still charge us??
TIA.
(for those of you who recognize me as a law student, i haven't covered this sort of stuff in my studies yet! )

bump

keeping my eye on this one

has it happened to you too pellmell?

I THINK I remember reading that they have 6 months to take the money (a bit like banks will accept cheques up to 6 months old) but I have no experience and no legal knowledge so don't rely on that completely.

I bought DH a Bose CD-Radio thingy in May 2007, and it's still not appeared on my credit card statement . Someone told me they had up to a year to claim the money. But six weeks is sounding hopeful...

I thought it was 6 months.

One of the car parks dh uses often charges 4 months after the event.

darn - was hoping it was only a month or something.. guess we will leave the money in there as credit in case they remember us at some point!

Regardless of the credit card processing company's policies and procedures, if you ate the meal you owe them the money. And you will know from your legal studies that in England and Wales a contractual debt may be persued at least 6 years after it falls due.

Not much point leaving a credit balance on the card though.

I would ring the restaurant (sorry - self righteous emoticon following) It may very well come out of the wages of the person who made the mistake. I worked in a place once where it was possible to end up working for nothing if you made a couple of mistakes in an evening.

thank you for reminding me of my conscience seeker!
and thank you for "reminding" me of what i should i know of my legal studies MrVibrating
think i will give the restaurant a ring and check it with them..

i bought some petrol a while back (this year)

it didnt show up on the following 2 statements, by which time i assumed they had missed it and was free ... but it showed up onthe 3rd statement and i had to pay it

so dont convince yourself yet that they have forgotten... they may remember around xmas / Jan