Charged twice for the same loan part?

As a newcomer to FC you need to know:
1/ FCs website is riddled with problems and FC doesn't care about that
2/ FC are usually very friendly and responsive if you phone them
3/ FC's email response is appalling - you get automatic 'we are busy' then it takes days

I am a reluctant user - FC gets relatively little criticism on this board because nobody listens, others get more criticism because they listen!
JP

Unfortunately it is a well known problem and it seems to have recently gone from rare to frequent. Double selling or double paying and even mismatches between loan parts received and paid for at auction. It is long standing and it seems that FC is unable to find and fix the problems that cause the error - for years.

There is a reconciliation bot which trolls round and tidies up occasionally. It has visited me a few times, and I leave a saucer of milk out for it at night. However, my account has been wrong for a while now and I assume the bot has been run over.

The system allowed me to buy the same loan part twice on two occasions on 22nd Dec 2014, again during a period of very slow response times.  In fact neither of the repeated purchases was successful, nor another nine single ones done at around the same time, although the purchases showed in my transaction history.

Contacted FC support and within a couple of days got a response, an apology and a correction by their reconciliation process.  This tidying up after the event gets your account in balance again, but it's a poor substitute for a working program.  As a former web and database programmer, I know the sort of multi-user, concurrent access issues that the programmers have to deal with and the growth in the number of lenders has no doubt brought its own problems in this regard.  But these issues are bread-and-butter to modern database engines that can be set to only allow a fully completed transaction to take place or not at all - not the one-sided, half baked updates that are going through on FC.

These problems are only going to get worse as the business grows - I'm sure they know this but have they got the in-house IT talent to sort it out?

You can assume that, but you'd be wrong .. I just sent them a list of about a dozen errors of one sort or another, going back to May 2014 which their own muck sweeper couldn't find, but mine could. Incomplete/duplicate transactions, trapped bids, part I bought/sold but was never charged for (they are still looking for that one), etc.

Hi stevet. It is good to hear that the reconciliation bot is alive and well, or has been replaced with a new one. She is very tidy and discrete and likes to leave no trace if at all possible. So the magic eraser is preferred.

It is becoming much more common - both on my account and on the forum reports. If you have not seen the previous advice then the thing to do is to know your stake (payments in less payments out) and keep it a round number. Then keep an eye open for an error by more than a few pennies in the formula stake + net earnings = FC total. When that goes wrong then you know you have a problem, and to put out a saucer of milk at night for the reconciliation bot. (She ought to have a name - FranCes, FranCesca, Fifi?)

Yes.

They will go back and remove transactions that "didn't happen" (a.k.a shouldn't have happened). Usually this is most evident for Loan Offer entries, that disappear if you are outbid/auction cancelled. Harder to spot are the other times, such as double bought, double sold loan parts. And the occasional correction of an erroneous amount on a transaction.

If you are trying to reconcile your account, good luck!

With the transactions on the statement being rather "fluid", and sometimes delayed -- so they insert themselves back-up-the-list a bit, it is very trying. Some activities cause an immediate statement entry, others show up the next day.

Beatrice Bot a good name and classy, but I think maybe too classy for cleaning up. May I introduce you to the lovely Betty Bot (is there a curly tail?) and suggest that FC bought theirs through Amazon (one used Betty Bot still available at £5.45) and just tweaked her program for reconciling (as only FC can).



My reconciliation error has been about £80 for some time, but this morning it is £120.25. That may just be 'catching up'. I do not have time to both go through my transactions and post on the forum. So my technique of putting out a saucer of milk at night for the bot-visitor is intended to ensure that the process does not lose me money. It works as well as anything else does.

Edit2: There are no duplicate loan part numbers in my last 2000 sales and so I have no idea what is going on. (Checked by cut and pasting 2000 records into Excel and using the 'remove duplicates' facility.)