In a rather humorous story today, many World of Warcraft players have received their monthly credit card statements, with the £8.99 subscription fee having been billed to either the Croydon Park Hotel in Croydon, Surrey or the Swallow St. George Hotel in Harrogate, Yorkshire.

It turns out that credit-card processing company EuroConex in Dublin, Ireland is to blame for the labelling error, but that didn't stop panicked WoW players from calling either hotel, their credit card company, or both. One woman said she had felt it necessary to cancel her credit card.

Others think the hotel has taken the money, Chingara said. The hotel has not received any money, he added, and pledged to return any mis-directed funds.

Chingara laid the blame for statements mis-labelling on an error at EuroConex, the County Dublin, Ireland-based credit-card processing company, which handles the Croydon Park Hotel's credit card receipts, those of the Swallow St. George Hotel and those of Blizzard Europe. EuroConex assured him that all funds had been correctly routed to Blizzard, he said, and that it would apologise in due course to affected customers via their credit card issuers.

Ahh, technology can be wonderful. At least the screw-up involved three and four-star hotels, and not a more ... uh, let's say "shady" business.