I am absolutely disgusted with the money making tactics that mortgage companies are using to "scam" homeowners! My mortgage payment is $1314.21 each month and I sent my March payment for that exact amount by check out on time (it is due before the 15th. I was checking my bank statement and noticed that the check had only been cashed for $1014.21. I immediately went to my online bank statement to verify that I had indeed written the check for the correct amount. I had. When I called the mortgage company to find out what was going on, they informed me that although the digits in the numerical box did indeed say $1314.21, the words written in the line below only said One thousand fourteen and 21/100 dollars. When I told them that obviously they knew what my mortage payment should be and the numbers were right, why didn't they just cash it for that amount, they told me it was the "law". I questioned them as to "what law" because I knew that in the 22 years I have been writing checks I must have made this mistake before and this had never happened. They couldn't answer that question. Since my payment was now going to be past due if it was not paid in full on that day that I was calling, I told them I wanted to make a telephone payment. They agreed but said I would be charged an additional fee of $20 for using this service. I was outraged.in 2006 Countrywide financed from 17 to 20% of all mortgages in the United States, at a value of about 3.5% of United States GDP, a proportion greater than any other single mortgage lender. If they are able to do this to only 10% of their customers each year, can you imagine how much revenue they are generating from this type of practice!? When I "balked" at the amount and demanded to speak to a supervisor, Ron (the person who was helping me) turned me over to Joyce. Joyce agreed to lower the fee of $20 to $10 and when I told her that this was ridiculous and that her company was "ripping off" homeowners she told me it was only $10! I told her that I needed to pay my mortgage in full so that I would not be charged a late fee and so that my credit rating would not be adversely affected so I gave permission for them to take $300 that I owed plus $10 for the "service fee" out of my checkings account. I also told her that I wasn't sure what I was going to do but I would make sure someone looked into what I believe to be a "fraudulent" practice. I also called the bank to find out about this law they mentioned and of course it does not exist. It is solely at the discretion of the mortgage company as to what they will attempt to cash the check for. I bet if I had written "One Million Dollars" in the "word amount line" they would not have tried to cash it for that amount!
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