I have been with Providian since December. Up until March of this year I had only been paying a little above the minimum payment. Then I started trying to get the balance down and starting making a payment to my account every payday which is every other friday. I got concerned when my balance didn't appear to be getting any smaller and then decided to cut up the card which this was about 4 months ago.
Back in May I received a notice from the company saying that I was over my limit and that they charged my account an overlimit fee of $35.00. This concerned me because as far as I new I hadn't used the card since December. Unfortunately since I hadn't used the card when I got my bill I very seldom looked at it because I knew what my minimum payment was. I had never had a credit card before and I got this one trying to build my credit.
Well I thought that maybe it was just a mess up and they said that I should send a required payment to cover the overlimit so trusting that this company won't lie I sent them the payment. Just a few weeks ago I received another notice of the same kind, keep in mind that I cut up the card 4 months ago. Seeing this again I got very angry asking myself how can I still be charged an overlimit fee.
I called the company to inquire about the problem and asked them how could I be over my limit when I haven't used the card since December. The only answer that I got was that the company has been charging me an over the limit fee since January of this year and that I also had two late payment charges of $25.00 also on the account. This has added a balance of $265.00 plus interest to my account.
I told the representative that I have paid over $300.00 since January and the majority of the payments were every two weeks. The person informed me that I was charged a late fee in April and again in June. I asked him how could I be charged a late fee for April when I made a payment on 3-01-02,3-12-02, and 3-26-02 and I made my payment for June on 05-17-02. I asked him if he could verify that all of these payment posted and he said that they had. I asked him how could this be called late and he said that the computer classified my payment as an over payment but not the required payment just because it posted several weeks before the due date.
He never said that it was an error on their part and that he wouldn't take the charges off. He also wouldn't take any of the overlimit fee's off. He basically just told me that they were valid charges and that I would have to pay them. I asked if I cancelled my card would it stop his company from charging my account the invalid overlimit fee's and I was transferred to cancellations. That person told me that my account would still draw interest but that I shouldn't see anymore overlimit charges.
I tried to call back to speak to a supervisor so that I could get a record of all of the charges to my account since I opened it and no one would let me talk to one. I also asked the person how much I have paid on the account and he could only go back one year and told me that in one year from August I had paid over $400.00 not counting the 8 months of payments that they couldn't look at. I only originally charged only $250.00 and now my account still has a balance of $681.27.
Darla
Wichita Falls, Texas
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