Hello everyone,
This information is a compilation of all the neat and wonderful things that I see happen with our cards daily and these are all facts.
- First National Bank or Marin as of February will be Credit One Bank quite possibly due to the sheer number of lawsuits against this bank under the old name... Neat way to fool everyone and look like they are new
- With our pre-approved application forms it says right on the front of the application form that you may be approved for up to $1000.00 for a credit but rarely do you ever see one of our credit cards with more than $300.00 on it when it is created. I know we deal with individuals that have had credit issues but come on getting everyones hopes up under false pretenses. Last I heard that was false advertising.
- Yes pretty much everyone knows that we have a post-office box for our payment mailing address but even when next day mail or priority service mail is sent to us it is a rare sight if ever that we actually post the cheques sent to us on the day that we receive them, rather they seem to go into a mysterious limbo for almost 7 days. Yes it is in our mail box in the time frames sepcified by the US Postal Service but still held by us for up to 7 days which in 90% of the cases result in late fees and over the credit limit fees being applied.
- Another anomaly for our credit card is that no matter how close one is to our payment mailing address again this mysterious 7 day hold goes on the mail and we only process after that date, hence in 90% of the cases forcing late fees and possibly over the credit limit fees because we dont post payments the day we actually receive them before the cut off time.
- Another very common error on our part is the fact that when a card holder sends in an information change ON THE FORM WE PROVIDE for them to let us know that addresses or phone numbers have changed we don't update their information on our system. Hence this usually again results in us getting more money by charging late fees and/or over the credit limit fees because WE DIDN'T UPDATE their information as per their request on OUR form and the don't get their statements.
- Another very common LACK of information provided to the card holder is that when they set up payments to go out to us through their local bank Bill Pay service, yet they are not informed that thier bank takes the money out of thier account then proceeds to mail us that payment on behalf of the customer. This as well invariably leads to more late fees and over the credit limit fees because we DON'T disclose this to them in our paper work. Now on that same note why don't we accept electronic payments electronically since this is the age of electronic transmission? Because if the payment is in the mail we have a better chance of charging fees to the card holders accounts since they don't know its mailed.
- Another big issues we have is that there is a $5.95 processing fee for doing payments on our website, through our automated phone system and as well through live agents. Now all that information that I have been given we do NOT disclose to the card holder this fact till they are about to make the payment.in most cases they have no option but to take this fee as it may once again may force them to get late fees or over the credit limit fees if they dont do it. Convenient no?
- We charge the $5.95 processing fee for doing debit/credit card payments, why in the name of anything normal would we charge the card holder this fee if our card is classified a high risk and we want to get our payments. Don't you think we should allow free debit card payments to help our card holders rather than trying to make them late?
- Generally as part of the card activiation procedure we let card holders know that they may receive courtesy calls from us if they start to get near payment due dates with no payments on their accounts. These calls come from our collections agents and are RARELY nice or friendly in manner.in fact they are usually down right obnoxious and demanding in nature. Great customer service don't you think?
- Again another mailing mystery to behold of our bank is that when a card holder sends us a request to close thier account through the mailing address we once again RARELY if EVER close the account as we are required to, so, yes you got it we can charge the monthly membership fees, late fees, over the credit limit fees and as well finance charges because we didn't do what we should have. This invariably results in us reporting to the credit bureaus information that really shouldn't be there becasue we didn't follow procedures. Amazing no.
- We have something called the Care Program for our cards which I find is a nice feature to our cards since it gives the card holder one last chance before we, the bank, permanently close their accounts. But as with our bank we do not formally release the card back to active use in a timely enough fashion. Why because while in the Care program all of our fees are still applicable to the accounts but the card holder can not use the card even though its paid off. Now I can understand keeping the card on hold for a full billing cycle after their account is paid off in this program to see if they will pay their next membership fee. But after 3-5 months in it I think this would be more classified as fraud.
- Heres another amazing fact; if we request that a card holder send something into us by means of a fax transmission we normally check our fax machines every couple of hours. But once again we RARELY if ever post the information from the card holder to the account in any timely fashion and in most cases we convienantly do not get teh faxes and have to have the card holder, you got it folks, do it again and again and again untill they evetually give up. This is most notable for payment release information from a card holders personal bank for verifying funds, name change information and dispute information as in the end of all this it might mean we have to do something. Nice customer service.
- With our bank we do let card holders know that they can call in at any time to check on the availability of credit line increases. With our credit line increases they are SUPPOSED to have either a $100.00 or $150.00 increase that has a possible cost attached to it which ranges from $0.00 to $40.00, but, in 80% of the cases it is always a $40.00 cost for a $100.00 increase. And this is ALWAYS the case on new accounts under 1 year. Now I can understand with our card that there may be a cost, but, always $30.00 to $40.00 regardless of the length of time. Can we say money grab rip off? And on the other side of that argument unless you have stellar credit scores and performance (which if you had why do you have our card in this case) they dont get a credit line increase at all.
- Heres a biggy. We tell all our card holders that they can access their information on our website, but once again, our website in most times, 50% of the time actually, does not allow, has errors, or loops itself so that card holders can not access their information online or do payments online. Gee now what's the point of having a website if it only works 50% of the time. Maybe we should only charge fees 50% of the time to match the website performance. That would be fair I think. But nope. Not matter if they cant get on the website, its ALWAYS something they do wrong and heaven forbid not the banks problem even though in most cases it is, being the information the bank has on record is wrong (because we dont upadte it properly at the card holders request) or we dont feel like fixing the website issues. And you got it again fols for those of us who work away from our home and need access online, if they dont have it, guess what we do again. We charge late fees and over the credit limit fees for our technical problems. What a stellar bank we are for customer service!
- Now what happens if you over pay your account and there is a balance owing back to you from the bank you ask? Well this does happen, more than you might think actually. Well if the card holder makes the request of us we have to send any balance of greater than $1.00 back to the card holder. Now with our bank, we do make the request to our computer system to have our finance department send the cheque to the card holder. But now the interesting part. We don't actually send out the balance refund cheques to the card holder in 95% of the cases because we hope that they will make charges on their account before we process the request. Neat hunh; and here's the kicker. We tell them that they should have it in roughly 7-10 days. Fraud on the go? I think so. And what happens when you close your account and there is a balance owing back to the card holder you ask. Well again we advise 7-10 days. But realistically you'd be better off looking for about 2-6 months and thats after making about 7-10 request of over that time frame for us to get off our butts and do it.
Now there is just one wonderully amazing bank hard at work for your interests. Advise to all those out there, please read and re-read our disclosure to you fully before accepting or activating our cards. You'd be suprised that we do tell you most of the stuff you need to know.
And one thing I will stick up for the bank on is this:
All my American brothers and sisters. You are not god, don't think we as the bank should be liable for your stupidity or lack of common sense. You don't take care of your accout properly yourself, be expecting fees. If you can't read, PLEASE have someone read the disclosure to you, it is not our place or requirment to babysit you.
Everyone have a stellar day.
Employee
Mat
Las Vegas, Nevada
U.S.A.
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