Josh Muszynski, 22, of Manchester, New Hampshire, was one Visa customer aghast to find the 17-digit charge on his bill. Adding insult to injury, he had also been hit with a $15 overdraft fee.
He noticed that his debt exceeded the world GDP while making a routine balance inquiry on his online Bank of America account. According to his statement, he had spent the profound sum in one pop at a nearby Mobil gas station -- his regular stop for Camel cigarettes.
"Very, very panicked," he jumped in his car and sped to the station.
- Log in to post comments
More like this
...you're poor. Previously, I discussed the effects of the de facto privatization of money:
But most of the discussion is over how large the fees should be. That's important, but ignores the larger issue: the de facto privatization of our monetary system. While it doesn't seem obvious, when you…
On poverty, personal, national and global, and why it makes sense not to have a bank account when you are poor (October 04, 2005). Espcially in light of recent news about the way big banks rip off people by depositing big checks first - placing accounts into the red - then depositing multiple…
Because people who pay what they owe on time hate America. Or something. Several banks--notably the ones whose asses we bailed out--plan on charging fees to cardholders who either pay off their balances on time or who don't use them very often:
You may believe that your exemplary behavior shields…
No one who knows me would ever consider me a domestic terrorist. I am, in fact, a pacifist. You may think that's naive, but it would be a real stretch to consider my pacifism to be the same as terrorism, even if you think it helps terrorism (in which case I strenuously disagree). I'm a doctor and…
That cigarette tax is getting out of control.
At 39% interest, no less!
Rt
What happened here isn't hard to figure out when one looks at the number. 2314885530818450000 when converted into hexadecimal is a string of 20s. 20 is the blank space. So somewhere spaces went where zeros should have been and something that should have checked for the variable type or something similar didn't occur.
A local news person reported that the 15-bux-charge was eliminated. Dunno how reliable the source, however....
Josh Muszynski, 22, of Manchester, New Hampshire, was one Visa customer aghast to find the 17-digit charge on his bill.
You mean there were some who weren't aghast?
Read about this NH story and saw a story on the same page saying someone in Texas received that exact charge on a dining bill. I looked it up and found over the last few days that several people around the US using VISA debit cards have had that charge. I have to wonder if it was an incorrect translation of some specific $ amount when charged, and a hexadecimal thing Joshua Zelinsky mentions is a good candidate.
Good call, Joshua. My first thought was to check the base 2 log to see if it was a byte overflow error of some kind, but no dice.
What if someone is traveling abroad (ie., Jamaica) and fuels a car at a gas station for about $30 (2400 Jamaican dollars)? The person puts it on his credit card and signs for 2400 Jamaican dollars. However, when the cc bill comes it shows $2400. The person does not have copy of the receipt. What do you advise to do? Thanks.