On April 29 I purchased a vehicle from Matthews Motors in Clayton, North Carolina. Matthew Motors financed my vehicle through Credit Acceptance. It was never brought to my attention that there was no grace period allowed when making your monthly payment. Your payment is due on the due date thats it no exceptions. You may as well be dealing with a loan shark. My first payment was due on May 29, since I had recently changed banks the check ordering process delayed the mailing of my payment until June 7
On June 12 my vehicle was repossessed. According to Customer Service Representatives this was because my check had not yet been received. So I was instructed by Mr. Washington in the Repossession Department to go to my bank and issue a stop payment on check# 2001 that had been mailed on June 7. Then I was to go to Wal-Mart to make an Express Payment of $338.66.
I was to then call the repossession department at (800) 634-1506 and gave them the reference number and once payment was verified. I could go and pick up my vehicle. As if this wasnt enough I now have to pay the person holding my vehicle a $25.00 storage fee. I was also told by Mr. Washington that I would be responsible for paying the total repossession fees of $330.00 with my June 29th payment. He assured me that there was no other payment arrangements that could be made for paying off these fees.
I received a call June 20 from Credit Acceptance Representative Latonya Pope who informed me that my payment was not showing on my account. She was able to call Wal-Mart Express Payment to verify that a payment had been made by me. For some reason my payment got posted to the wrong account. Ms. Pope advised me that she would make a note in the system and that should take care of the problem. Ms. Pope was also kind enough to arrange for me to pay the repossession charges over the next three months with my regular payment. Let me commend Ms Pope by saying she has been the only person that I have dealt with at Credit Acceptance who actually treated me with customer service and seemed genuinely concerned about getting my problem resolved. When I got off the phone yesterday I assumed everything had been corrected and that the next 3 monthly payments that I made would be in the amount of $428.18 which included 1/3 of the repossession fees.
When I arrived home from church today, my 7 year old looks out the window and asks me mom where did you park your car. I immediately get on the phone with Jeremy a supervisor at Credit Acceptance who was very rude and in my opinion has no business being a customer service supervisor because he has no people skills whatsoever. Jeremy went on to tell me that there is nothing that he can do.
He advised that I had no choice but to call the repossession department the next day at 8:00 CST. The problem I have with this is I'm scheduled to be at work at 8:00 EST. This makes twice that I have had to deal with the mental stress of this situation as well as having to take 8 hours of my PTO time to get these matters resolved. I live in an apartment complex and do you know how embarrassing it is to have your vehicle repossessed in the broad daylight not once but twice in one week over the same payment.
I know that I am just an account number in the Credit Acceptance big book of business, however, what has happened to me is and countless others is an outrage Had these terms and conditions been explained to me I would have never agreed to purchase the vehicle under this type of agreement. I am a single mother with two children and I raise them on one income. I dont have the best credit in the world but I am working on trying to get it back in order. I cant afford to lose my job because my vehicle was erroneously repossessed not once but twice in one week. I am probably wasting my time in hoping that an effort will be made to correct this process. However, I'm prepared to take this as far as I have to take it to see that these unfair trade practices are stopped. I'm going to tell my story to anyone who will listen. I'm going to spare the next person from having to go through the embarrassment of erroneous repossession and extortion of fee's that should have never been incurred.
I have therefore written to Matthew Motors, the Credit Acceptance Shareholders, Board of Directors, Internal Relations, The Michigan Better Business Bureau and The Detroit Free Press and Im prepared to take this as far as I can take it. This has got to stop Credit Acceptance is not helping people repair their credit. When you help someone you listen. Credit Acceptance is not in touch with their customers and aside from Latonya Pope customer service is non existent.
Advocate for the Consume
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