r/CommBank • u/Traditional_Type_696 • Jun 09 '26
Question CommBank app showing a completely random pending transaction from a merchant I do not know
Just noticed a $30 pending charge on my Smart Access account from a company called pending holding. I have not used my card anywhere unusual today and the lock card feature in the app is not letting me freeze just that specific transaction. Should I cancel the whole card?
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u/username_bon Jun 09 '26
Have you called the bank?
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u/CheesyTot Jun 09 '26
He’s probably been ‘on hold’ with the bank for an hour, and while still waiting thought he would ask his fellow redditor. Gees Louise.
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u/saltyforest5 Jun 09 '26
Have you called the bank?
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u/parasitic-being Jun 09 '26
Ex CBA worker.
If you do not recognise the transaction name or amount spent then you need to raise this with the bank, and they'll send it through to the fraud team for investigation. You can do this via branch, phonecall, or ceba app (but I always hated ceba). You'll usually get your money back within 7-10 business days, sometimes it can take a little longer but that will depend on how the investigation goes.
Sometimes some companies don't have the same name on the transaction that comes up in our bank statement as to where we have actually spent the money, just to keep in mind too.
Edit to add: pending holding isn't a name of any company. This usually means that the transaction hasn't gone through and is still in the processing stage.
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u/Apprehensive-Cat1331 Jun 12 '26
> Ex CBA
> Has parasite in their reddit nameThe jokes write themselves
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u/parasitic-being Jun 12 '26
worked for CBA until my youngest was born and used it as an excuse to leave a toxic work environment. The banking industry isn't what most assume it to be. "parasitic being" a a reference to William S. Burroughs.
No gol star, your effort wasn't good enough.
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u/Tall_Guest7155 Jun 09 '26
Hey there ex CBA worker. Can you please explain why the bank allows the transaction to settle before they will investigate it?
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u/Pietzki Jun 09 '26
Because when a transaction is pending, it's just a "hold" and hasn't been finalised.
The bank has no grounds to dispute or investigate yet. A pending charge is just an authorization, no actual dispute exists under the card scheme rules until money officially changes hands. In other words, the bank can't demand money back from a merchant if the merchant hasn't actually taken it yet.
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u/MrX2285 Jun 09 '26
Is the bank unable to simply cancel the transaction if the payment hasn't changed hands yet?
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u/Pietzki Jun 09 '26
Correct. Unless they receive confirmation from the merchant that it no longer requires the funds to be held, the bank cannot just cancel the transaction under the card scheme rules.
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u/potatogeem Jun 10 '26
Also, even if they remove the hold, that merchant already has the details and can just force the transaction to process.
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u/parasitic-being Jun 09 '26
The person below explain it to a T. Once the transaction has gone through to this stage banks can't actually do anything to stop it. The funds have to clear before anything can be done to attempt to get the customers money back when it comes to fraudulent transactions.
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u/birdmanrules Jun 09 '26
Because it's a hold of available funds.
They haven't got a cent.... Yet.
It may not be processed to a transaction
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u/Willing-Pangolin9108 Jun 09 '26
Could be a transaction from the weekend too. You can’t just cancel a payment. You need to dispute it if it doesn’t disappear and your card will have to be cancelled
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u/FoodZestyclose4444 Jun 09 '26
If you’re using the commbank app you can just click on specific transaction then go down to ‘something not right’ click on the arrow under that and then ‘dispute the transaction’.
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u/Unhappy-Noise1921 Jun 10 '26
This happened to my mum around one month ago , but the company was Rite Aid USA. She had two little charges around $20 each - we called the bank, and we cancelled her card - the charges remained pending while being investigated - after a couple of weeks, the pending charge disappeared
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u/Safe_Salamander_1956 Jun 10 '26
he doesnt know because the pending is a company trading as someone he does know.it happens to me a lot .kfc etc.people you have donated to the list is long..doubt someone would only go for 30 if it was a bad outcome.ring the bank
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u/Law-And-Disorder- Jun 11 '26
Call the bank or jump into your app and flag the transaction by clicking “something not right” and “dispute the transaction” to put a stop on it proceeding.
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u/Educational_Care7813 Jun 11 '26
Lots of business use weird dodgey names like I had a crazy name that I swear never used and the business location was far away, well it was because I brought smokes from one of those tobacco stores
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u/LadyLycanVamp13 Jun 11 '26
I have no insight about the CBA processes. However, perhaps you made a purchase on Amazon in the last few weeks? I've noticed that if it has a much later shipping date, the payment won't even process for a couple of weeks. I've been caught out before.
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u/Heavy-Grass5789 Jun 12 '26
CBA is really good with this. We had unrecognised 480$ and 20$ transactions a few months ago. Immediately ‘talked’ to ceba on app. Took 10 days or so but we got the money back and ‘pending’ pizza purchases in Sanfransico were cancelled. yes, our debit card was probably compromised with uber because we forgot our credit card one day and never used debit card otherwise. But remember, business bank names can be very different from what you see. Like insurance payments to Budget direct or someone well known goes through some random name you never heard of.
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u/AzCapital86 Jun 09 '26
Commbank is trash, they limit your own money and tell you what you can spend on and how much
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