Honeymoon... Sand Banks and Money Banks..

Booked the honeymoon today, or at least tried to!! Bank of Scotland not withstanding.

We have finally settled on the Maldivian Island of Meeru, and we are having a jacuzzi water villa! That will keep us both happy! So we headed to Thomas Cook and spoke to a really nice lady who helped us out no end, even phoning up the island resort itself to make sure we would be getting exactly what we wanted!! It was going to be expensive but we wanted to celebrate with a once in a lifetime trip! The holiday includes a dive, a night fishing and a session on the golf driving range(!) We are taking a speed boat from Male to the island which is an hours trip, but should give us an opportunity to see all the sights of the Maldives!!

The title suggests that we had bank problems, and we did! Thank you Bank of Scotland for making life difficult! We had money in my account to cover the deposit, but then we decided that we would pay the full amount when we booked the holiday so we moved the rest of the funds into our joint account, we'd need to make two payments but that'd be fine...

..no it wouldn't. We started with the deposit amount and all went through fine, no problem at all. Then we said can we just pay the rest of the amount due, sure. We hand over our card and she starts the banking process. The amount is high so, of course, so she had to contact the bank for a permission code (or something) so she used the telephone banking system, putting it on speaker phone so we could hear what was going on. After a few typings of various numbers and codes the automated voice announces to the entire travel agency "Card Declined". She quickly turns off speaker phone to save us the embarrassment that has already occurred. She tries again but with the same result.
What!? Where has al our miney gone!!! Who has our money!!!?
The bank is of course closed when we go in to try and sort it out.

**Addition** After contacting the bank today (Monday) we have found that they have put out account on suspension. Why? Because we have two cards for our joint account, one is mine one is Dave's, however Dave never uses his card, whereas I use mine all the time. But becuase one of the cards is 'idle' they suspended the account!! But of course for security reasons they can't send you any paperwork to tell you they have suspended the account! We can't sort it over the phone we have to go into the bank.

**Second Addition** We went into the bank to re-activate our account, armed with as much prrof of identity as we can find!
"We've come to re-activate our account"
"Okay, that's it re-activated"
"What we don't need to prove who we are?"
"Nope"

Fair enough. We want to pay for the rest of the honeymoon today..

"Will we be able to use the account?
"No it'll take a day to re-activate fully"
"Oh. Can we transfer the money over into my account and use it from there?"
"Yes."
"Still without proving who we are?
"Yes"

Loving the security!

Anyhow, the honeymoon is paid for and we are all set to go! BIt worried about the whole name change thing but have been assured that as long as my password is in the same name as the tickets there won't be a problem....