Throughout the last few days, there have been countless complaints from customers about their bills. Many investors woke up to see more than one transaction fee on their Coinbase accounts. Charges that ended up costing many people thousands of dollars.
According to the company, all users who made trades between January 22nd and February 11th could be affected by the mistake. However, Coinbase has promised to reimburse all loses to its customers and are encouraging everyone to report any problems with their bills to help them get to the root of the problem.
Fixing the System’s Mistake
According to Coinbase, they are investigating the system error that affected thousands of its users. The company added that the error is somehow related to recent changes that were made to their “Merchant Category Code” or MCC.
The change resulted in additional charges to transactions and the unauthorized withdrawal of funds from user accounts. This was due to the system registering cryptographic transactions as cash advances by credit providers.
The company also confirmed that they have identified the problem and that all future transactions will not be affected by the error. They have also promised to reimburse all users who were wrongly billed.
Banning the Purchase of Cryptocurrency with Credit
Recently, cryptocurrencies have been the target of big banks around the world. In fact, Lloyds Banking Group in England has announced that they are prohibiting the purchase of all digital currencies with credit. The ban also affects its subsidiaries such as Halifax, the MBNA and the Bank of Scotland.
With the aim of protecting their client’s assets, several banks in America have also made the same decision. A choice which is the root of the changes to the MCC used by companies like Visa to identify transactions made with cryptocurrencies.
Reparation to All Victims
According to Dan Romero, Coinbase’s Vice-President, the company is working with Visa to reimburse all clients who were affected by the error as soon as possible. In addition, Coinbase is urging its users to check and report any suspicious charges to their accounts.
Moreover, Coinbase has issued a formal apology to all users and has announced that they are working to improve user experience by actively collaborating with other networks and banks.
