I rented a battery the other day and it seems like I was charged twice, what do I do?
- When you tapped your card to start the rental, the bank temporarily reserved a deposit; this is called pre-authorization. In many banks this transaction appears with a "pending" status, although not all banks handle it the same way.
⚠️ This is why your bank may send you a notification and show it as a charge, but this is not an actual charge — it just ensures that there are enough funds to cover the rental. - Once your rental ends, the net effect on your account will equal the total cost of the rental.
- Depending on your bank, it may take anywhere from a few seconds to a few days for the pre-authorized amount (the deposit) to be released from your account. Sometimes, pre-authorization transactions may look like actual charges (making your account balance appear to be affected twice), but this is not the case. The amount will be released later, and you will see that your account was charged only once and only for the rental price.
For CaixaBank customers:In our experience, most of the complaints and concerns about possible erroneous charges that we receive come from CaixaBank customers.
After a detailed investigation together with the CaixaBank's customer service, we have identified that this is due to the way CaixaBank reflects transactions, as it does not clearly distinguish between pre-authorization transactions and actual charges, and the time it takes to release the deposit held during the pre-authorization.
Unfortunately, FireVolt has no control over these processes, but we can assure you that in all these cases, the situation was resolved simply by waiting for CaixaBank to release the deposit held during the pre-authorization, which can take up to 25 days, but is usually much faster.
Rentals with additional charges
If the total cost of your rental is less than the reserved deposit, the system will refund the difference. If the cost exceeds the deposit (including cases where you never returned the battery or returned it after 48 hours), an additional charge will be made.
If the total cost of your rental is less than the reserved deposit, the system will refund the difference. If the cost exceeds the deposit (including cases where you never returned the battery or returned it after 48 hours), an additional charge will be made.
This additional charge may initially appear as a pre-authorization transaction and then as a final charge. This may seem like a duplication of charges, but it is not; the same logic explained above applies. This is completely normal.
FireVolt releases the pre-authorised amounts immediately when you return the battery, but we do not control the timelines for unfreezing pre-authorizations at each bank. To find out when your bank will release the funds, you will need to contact them directly, as we do not have this information. Upon your request, we will immediately provide a receipt from our payment system (called Stripe) with all transaction details, which you can then present to your bank.
Here is a full article on how pre-authorization works: