As cost-of-living pressures continue to climb, people are looking for creative ways to save. One method gaining popularity on social media is called "cash stuffing". It's a reinvention of the old envelope system our grandparents used to use, and it's bringing back the use of physical cash.
But the general premise of “No, you can’t autodebit” or “Sure, I’ll let you think you can auto-debit. Doesn’t mean I’ll have it turned on at that moment” still holds.
That doesn’t hold in Australia. I’ve never heard of a bank here that allows you to (easily) stop someone from taking money out of your account. In fact, even if the account is empty they might be able to overdraw it if they have the right level of merchant account (I had that happen once, when I booked a flight that was about to depart, and they messed up/failed to charge me for the flight. Three months later someone noticed and my account was charged/overdrawn).
As someone who runs a business that charges customers money all day every day… if I have the customer’s details then I can charge their account whatever I want. Sure, I could go to jail (or be sent out of business) if I do the wrong thing… but there isn’t really much protection below that point and if I’m only mildly scummy, I’d probably get away with it.
That doesn’t hold in Australia. I’ve never heard of a bank here that allows you to (easily) stop someone from taking money out of your account. In fact, even if the account is empty they might be able to overdraw it if they have the right level of merchant account (I had that happen once, when I booked a flight that was about to depart, and they messed up/failed to charge me for the flight. Three months later someone noticed and my account was charged/overdrawn).
As someone who runs a business that charges customers money all day every day… if I have the customer’s details then I can charge their account whatever I want. Sure, I could go to jail (or be sent out of business) if I do the wrong thing… but there isn’t really much protection below that point and if I’m only mildly scummy, I’d probably get away with it.
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