What a pile of baloney. Everybody I know (UK) uses a debit card. The reason being: it's your money, so you can't overspend or spend money that isn't yours/you don't have. Avoiding credit cards isn't bad practice, and good credit can still be built from paying bills by Direct Debit, etc.
What happened to the OP has never happened to me, and I've never heard of it happening to anybody else. I'd be pretty pissed if it happened to me.
Why everybody seems so unsympathetic and rude is beyond me.
95% of the people I know use credit cards in the UK when purchasing items over £100 as credit cards offer the consumer more protection if things go wrong such as this situation. However the OP may not have access to a credit card and therefore is in this situation which is unfortunate.