I've decided i don't like banks

In this day and age of the internet, where masses of information is available at the click of a button, how hard can it be for a simple transaction to appear on your statement the day after you made it, why the 3-day wait? It's not like it takes a while to take the money, as your account is debited immediately.

This particular moan has been brought on by me trying to get tickets this morning for Muse at Wembley stadium. I checked my Egg credit card balance beforehand, and it said -£297. Great, i thought, that gives me £200 to play with before i'm up to my limit. 9am i was there clicking refresh until the tickets went on sale, and immediately got 4 standing tickets.

Then suddenly it dawned on me that i'd filled up with petrol the day before which came to £39. This left only £164 for me to spend, and, fully in line with sod's law, 4 tickets plus booking fees came to £169. The ticket booking system doesn't authorise payment for a few hours, so i couldn't go back and book any more as there's a 4 ticket limit per household. I phoned them and asked them if i could change payment methods but they couldn't do it. I then phoned Egg to try to get my credit limit increased by £10, which seems ridiculous, but they wouldn't allow it as i don't earn enough to even apply for a credit card now. I was doomed!

This story did have a happy ending for me, as an extra date was added at 10:30, and I was able to get 4 more tickets for that and pay for them with a different card. What gets to me is the fact that all my hassle could have been avoided if yesterday's petrol had showed up on my statement. The bloke on the phone could see it there on my account, so why couldn't I?

I don't know all the technical stuff behind what goes on when you make a payment, but surely it could be as simple as: Cardholder buys something --> Card issuer checks available funds and authorises payment --> Balances automagically changed over night and transactions appear the next day.

Grrrrrr. Rant over! :-)