Argos overcharges 190,000 customers

Admits to charging shoppers twice

View more images

29 October 2008 17:10 GMT / By Katie Scott

Hundreds of thousands of Argos customers have been left worrying that they are now in the red after the retailer double charged for their purchases.

Argos has admitted that 190,000 customers were twice in one day - last Friday (24 October).

It means millions of pounds were wrongly withdrawn from bank accounts, leaving shoppers concerned that their accounts have been plunged into the red, and that they will incur bank charges.

The mistake only came to light after customers chekced their bank accounts and then contacted the retailer.

However, in a move that will further upset their customers, Argos has said that they won't get their money back until next week.

A spokesman for the retail giant told Sky News: "Argos would like to apologise to any customer who was double charged when making a purchase".

"We believe that approximately 190,000 customers have been affected. At this stage it is impossible to state the exact figure taken from customers' accounts but it is likely that this will be several millions of pounds."

"As soon as we became aware of the issue on Monday morning we immediately briefed stores and customer services."

"Steps were put in place to rectify the error and a correction was run to ensure any affected customers had the duplicate charge refunded."

"This is now complete but it may take several days for the banks to process the refund and for it to reappear in customers' accounts."

Customers can contact Argos customer services on 0845 6403030.