This event took place over many months beginning in February:
I responded to a 0% APR letter from Capital One Bank.
I borrowed around $5,000 at 0% APR for for a number of months.
Everything went well for the first 3 months. I made my payments on time every month and paid 0% APR.
However, on or about the fourth month, my statement had a late payment fee and very high finance charges.
I called Capital One right away and explained I had made the payment and that it was made via my electronic payment company who had proof of on-time delivery.
Capital One was very nice and said they would remove the late charges and finance charges from my account.
The following month, the charges were not removed and I was still being charged a very high APR. I called again and explained that I continued to make my payments on time and submitted proof which Capitol One accepted. Capital One said they would correct the problem and would remove the finance charges and late charge from my account. Capital One said that sometimes corrections do not show up on the account for 2 billing cycles.
This same chain of events went on for months (many billing cycles). By now, the billing statement had grown with finance charges and late fees. It would now take a CPA to figure out what my monthly statement should be and how to remove all of the fees and charges. I continued to call Capital One and they continued to appologize and said my account would be credited. However, it was not and charges were really piling up.
Many months later and after talking to many customer service representatives and supervisors, I finally got one who actually helped me. I went through all my notes of who I talked to, when, and what was said or resolved. My account was a mess. I could not begin to figure out how much I was over-charged. But I made a stab at it. It actually took hours of my time and a lot of work on Excel to put everything together and come up with a number that would put my account back in good standing and make a final payment. I wanted to get out of the mess "with my shirt still on". It was a nightmare. I've always had perfect credit and precision accounting methods. But this was beyond my level of expertise.
However, the nice supervisor on the other end of the phone must have realized the catastrophy and asked me for my number. We settled on that amount and she cleared my account. Thank you, who ever you are at Capital One!
Regardless of the reconciliation, I could see that Capital One thought they could get away with promising 0% APR, then claiming they did not receive my payment on time, and then charging me the default APR at a very high percentage.
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