A California couple who were celebrating their five-year anniversary with a trip to Guatemala were mistakenly charged $30,000 after taking an Uber ride when the app mistakenly converted the local currency to dollars.
Douglas Ordonez and Dominic Adams of Riverside were left with no money for the rest of their trip after thousands of dollars were overdrawn from their bank accounts.
The mistake appears to have occurred when Uber ran the couple’s debit card for ₡30,000 Costa Rican Colones (about $55 US dollars) — but processed the taxi ride for $30,000 instead.
Adams, who was in Costa Rica, was taking an Uber to the airport to catch a flight to Guatemala where she planned to meet her husband for a romantic celebration.
‘I took an Uber, everything was fine, I didn’t think twice about it,’ Adams told KTLA, until she got a call from her concerned husband who found that their joint bank account had been completely drained after his own card was declined.
Douglas Ordonez and Dominic Adams are seen on their anniversary in Guatemala
Dominique Adams and Douglas Ordonez are celebrating their five-year anniversary in Guatemala after being mistakenly charged $30,000 for an Uber ride due to a currency conversion error.
The error occurred when Uber processed the couple’s debit card transaction for $30,000 instead of 30,000 Costa Rican Colones (about $55 USD).
@dominique.xo.xo
Trying not to spoil the rest of my trip with this, but…. Yes! @Uber charged me $29,994 for a single ride! The correct conversion should have been $54, but was charged 600% more. Contacted Uber: they replied w/ “don’t worry”, but no further assistance 😩 I can’t find a customer service number anywhere. They ignored my messages and I only got pre-generated messages. Yes, I immediately contacted my financial institution @Altura Credit Union. They said they can’t do anything about it at this point as I have to wait another 4 days for the amount to be converted to the correct amount. Can’t believe they are allowed to process payments of this amount. Failed safety measures and negligence. So now I’m traveling out of county with no way to access my funds 🙃 pray for me 🙏🏽 just trying to enjoy my vacation 🌴 #emotionaldamage#horrorstory#uberscam#uber#fyp#viral#travelhorrorstory#wtf#traveltiktok
♬ Song Oh No Oh No Oh No No No – Hip Hop
‘He checked our bank account and saw a charge of about $30,000, and we were both like “What the hell? What are we going to do?”‘
“The bank was blaming Uber, and Uber was blaming the bank,” Adams said. ‘I took Uber, everything was fine, I got the receipt emailed to me and then the next morning when we both realized I was charged in US dollars.’
‘I got the insufficient funds notice, and I knew we had money in the account, so I tried again, and it said the same thing. Then I checked my bank account, and that’s when I saw a $30,000 charge,’ Ordonez told Insider.
The couple says they spent their vacation using whatever little cash they had. Adams posted a clip about the incident on TikTok the next day.
‘We were both distraught, stuck in limbo, feeling like there was nothing we could do,’ he added. We kept calling the bank for an update, and that’s when we were blamed for the mistake because we called our bank to give them a travel notice, the bank said “that’s what allowed the charge to go through,” Adams said.
@dominique.xo.xo
In reply to @user485530046132 ‼️‼️ Part 2 (posting part 3) I always use my credit card for international charges. Unfortunately, I was in a hurry and didn’t realize my debit card was linked to my @Uber account. Yes- obviously taxis, shuttles are good in Costa Rica, but I was traveling alone and Uber was more convenient at that moment.
♬ Aesthetic – Tollan Kim
@dominique.xo.xo
@Chanel ‼️‼️ Responding to Part 3 Still haven’t heard from @Uber …. My account was on hold when it was “resolved” and I didn’t have access to $$ while traveling internationally. @Altura Credit Union refused to send me anything that outlined the policy, but I responded in an email after I outlined the negligence and failed security measures. 🤬 Still trying to get an answer… 😩😩 Side note: If you haven’t been to Guatemala, make sure you do. It’s beautiful here! ✈️🌴 #emotionaldamage #horrorstory #uberscam #uber #fyp #travelhorrorstory #traveltiktok
♬ Aesthetic – Tollan Kim
Adams posted a clip about the incident on TikTok the day after recounting her story
Customer service seems to be coming in handy with AI generated help
The California couple found themselves without any money for their trip after draining their bank accounts
The couple said they would never use Uber again and made sure to use a credit card instead of debit
Adams took to TikTok to document her ordeal
‘Can’t believe they allowed this amount of payment to be processed. Failed security measures and negligence,’ he added.
The couple claims their bank, Altura Credit Union, was equally unhelpful in assisting them.
It took another four days before the charge of $29,994.33 was finally reversed.
‘To date, Uber has not contacted us. They did email us back. They marked this case as resolved in their app before it was resolved. They were very neglected,’ Adams said.
Uber has since responded in a statement about the couple’s ordeal: ‘At Uber, we take every report seriously. As soon as we received the user’s report, our support team immediately resolved the issue and released the authorization hold that was wrongly applied due to a bank error in dollars, not corns. However, the time it takes to process refunds depends on each bank’s policy.’
The couple said they would never use Uber again and advised fellow passengers to use a credit card on their account instead of debiting it.
“I will probably never use Uber again just knowing that their customer service is really terrible,” Adams said.
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