COMMUTERS have been hit with a flurry of charges after tapping their contactless card to board a bus once – with one Scot even being charged ten times in one hour.
Multiple cases have arisen over the past week with commuters using Lothian Buses, operating services in and around Edinburgh, complaining on social media about the issue.
Service users noticed the issue after using contactless payment to board services in the capital, wherein after their journeys were complete, they would be charged 10p until the full payment for the travel was collected later.
Typically, they would only be charged 10p for each bus journey they took until the end of a week when full payments for their travel in the same period would be collected.
However, some issues arose which saw several commuters being charged dozens of times in short periods after using contactless to pay for their trip.
One, posting a screenshot of the flurry of transactions to social media yesterday, was charged upwards of ten times, each a pending transaction for 10p which will later be totalled to a larger sum.
The same commuter visited Lothian Buses’ travel hub on Shandwick Place to inquire about the transactions.
A glitch in their payment system appears to be the culprit, with the commuter allegedly being told that he would be refunded in due course for any additional charges.
A member of staff at the Lothian Buses hub explained the issue is expected to be fixed in 24 hours with any additional or wrongful charges being refunded.
Explaining their predicament online, the commuter said: “Multiple transactions from Lothian Bus Transport.
“Hello. Has anybody experienced having more than 10 transactions in an hour? I’ve contacted my bank to dispute this but not sure how to contact Lothian Buses.”
The post received dozens of likes and comments from locals, some of whom had experienced the same issue.
One user wrote: “Suspect there has been a delay in them uploading all their transactions, which is why you are seeing this.
“Easy check would be if you don’t have any transactions over the past few days where they should have been.
“This happened to me earlier in the year – the transactions were all correct but had come through delayed.”
Another replied: “Strange, I’ve just had this overnight too.”
Speaking today, a Lothian spokesperson said: “We are aware of recent issue with our contactless payment system which affected a number of our customers.
“We would encourage anyone with further enquiries to check their journey and payment history via the portal on our website, or to reach out to our dedicated Product Support team who can assist further.”
