Give me the money back!

Some weeks ago I went with some friends to the beach and we went by car. As we cannot go to the beach with the car we have to park it in a parking lot. After two hours of traffic jams we managed to find a place and come to the beach to enjoy. After all fun and joy we return to the parking lot to take the car and come back home.

So, after queuing a quarter of an hour to pay, I decided to do so with my credit card, just to make it fast. And indeed it was faster than we had imagined: the machine took the card and put it out in nothing of time. But the parking was paid. We were happy.

A time after, checking my financial situation, I checked my credit card balance too: Surprise! the parking had been charged twice. So, I started with all the bureaucratic circuit to claim my money back.

First I called the credit card bank. They asked me to contact the company that charged twice and ask them gently to reimburse the money incorrectly charged. If after this inquire I didn't have a satisfactory reply, we could start a formal reimbursement claim.

Second, I tried to find out which company is managing the parking lot, or at least the automatic payment machines. I googled, and googled and didn't find anything. So, as a intermediate step, I decided to make a complaint to the municipality, asking for the information I was looking for.

Some days past and no response. Some further googling and no luck, no way to get in touch with the parking company. Therefore, I asked to proceed with the reimbursement complain from the bank. They sent me by post the forms to fill in and initiate the complaint.

The days I got such forms, I got a response from the municipality:

Dear Mr. Villegas,

You posted a message at www.denhaag.nl about paying for parking in the corner of the Zwolsestraat and Harstenhoekweg. The pay & display machines outdoors in this area don't accept payment by credit card. For this reason it is difficult to address your question properly.

This brings me to the following. An explanation might be that you parked your car in the indoor car park Parking Scheveningen Bad. You may find this facility on the Internet at: www.parkerenscheveningen.nl . The company operating this car park is:

(...)

I got a phone number to contact the company. So did I, and surprisingly I talk to a guy who was in charge of the reimbursement of all affected people by the machines. They were going to credit the money back in a couple of days, I just had to wait and the money had to get back.

And, guess what, the money got back. The credit the second (and wrong) charge and the procedure was in practice finished.

This is just an example of how the problems must be carried out.

* You have to be patient, very patient. It took me three weeks in total to get what I wanted to.

* In all moments, the involved people just tried to make me happy, especially the guy from the guilty company. No excuses, just recognized their error.

* The drawback: I spent some time searching, talking on the phone and stressing myself thinking about how stupid I was by using this automatic payment machines.

* It was only for 10€... but finally I got what it was the correct thing.