I tried to do my banking online, as I had hundreds of times before. All of a sudden, when I tried to log on to my Citibank account, my user name and password were no longer good enough. A PIN had to be entered, as well as the bank card number?!
I scrambled to find my card, but I realized I did not have a PIN. There is no need for one, since I do not use the ATM. I go to my branch when I am home, but obviously I am not there now.
So I could not get to my account to make the money transfers I needed, set up payments, and so on. Major headaches, not to mention being blocked from my own money!
Now, after calling, India will mail me a PIN. It means a week at least until I can work with my account!
The people at 1 800 374 9700 in India (this is where Citi has its "customer service") were laughing at me. They said, "You must have typed a number wrong or misspelled the security question." So they are keeping me away from my money for my own protection, for a while, say for at least a week.
There was no warning and no automatic PIN sent by mail before implementing such new "security" features, nothing at all. Just fraudulent banking practices, that is all.
Beware of Citibank. Tactics like these show they might not be solvent!
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