Dubai: At first glance, the number looked strange. Was it Dh96 or Dh966,097?
Clearly there were more digits on Mohammad Sami’s credit card payment receipt than logical!
The Dubai resident, who was visiting relatives in Sharjah recently decided to pull out a pen and place some commas on his receipt to make sense of the exorbitant amount he was seeing on his bill.
But as they say – numbers don’t lie. He had been charged nearly a million dirhams for a fast-food take out!
Sami, who works as a finance manager at a Dubai-based consultancy told Gulf News: “I was with my family in Sharjah a few weeks ago and saw a branch of a restaurant that I usually visit in Dubai. After ordering three hotdogs and two burgers, I gave my credit card to the cashier. While putting in the card pin, I couldn’t see the amount charged on the machine, which I thought was strange, but I entered the pin anyway. Later, when I saw the receipt, I freaked out a little bit. I called up my bank, even though I knew I didn’t have such a credit limit, but I just wanted to make sure it wasn’t a case of overdraft.”
He also called the restaurant to make sure the payment had not gone through.
After weeks of the receipt simply lying around in his purse, he saw it once again and decided to share the amusing story with his colleagues.
Ayesha Sequeira, who works as an administrator in his office, said Sami walked up to her and just showed her the receipt.
“I looked at the amount on the bill and was shocked. I asked him: ‘What did you buy?!’ He replied: ‘Hotdogs!’”
“I thought it was really funny that my boss got charged almost a million dirhams for some hotdogs and burgers.”
Lost in all the humour is the fact that Sami still owes the restaurant the original amount of money.
“The payment didn’t go through and they were in touch with me to make sure the amount doesn’t get charged on my credit card. So, I still need to pay them Dh96 ...,” Sami said.
