Dear Rip,
I am one of the screwed. The phone call I received was totally
misrepresented. Thus, I agreed to sign up. Stupid me. NOW I check out the Internet. Why? Well, the $199 membership fee hit on 10/31 (as expected — appropriate date!), but I just got "the letter" in the mail yesterday.
SURPRISE!"The following items will be charged to your CCA Card after your membership card is activated"
Rush Processing $19.95 This was epected
Purchase Security Guard $49.95???
Extender and Protector $49.95???
Preferred Membership $49.95 What other kind is there? They simply said that I'd BE a preferred member, but didn't mention the $50.
Then I called. All the "secondary charges were set to go automatically against my checking account. Why? Because the $199 went against it, and by default the next charges would too. (God knows WHEN they would have hit my account!) I said, "I thought that stuff like Rush Processing would be charged against the card, not the account (as represented to me on the
phone). She (Mary) said, "That's if it is not an automatic account." I said, "But I thought that I would be paying exactly 10% of the balance of my account per month with no interest." Mary says, "Well, your purchases will have no interest, but these charges have to be paid in full before you can use your card. Then she said, and this is choice, "You use your card
free for 30 days. After that, you pay your annual membership fee." I said, "Nobody ever said a thing about a separate annual fee." She goes on about how they have to charge an annual fee, blah, blah, blah.
Now you tell ME: Membership fee (already incurred): $199. Preferred Membership: $49.95. Annual Membership fee: $99. HELLO??!!!
What's worse, she says that the $199 is non-refundable, and that, "you were told that when you activated your card". Well, I have only this stupid-looking piece of plastic, and according to Mary's requirements, could not be the "permanent car". I would have had to pay the $199 before I would receive the permanent card. The thing I had was a temporary card. I said, "So what can I do with the temporary card?" She said, "Nothing." I
love it!
OK. I could live with all this crap IF they had not mis-represented the most important aspects of why I signed up.
1. I was told that I'd be able to get cash against the card somewhere between $20-150 PER DAY. Mary says, Oh no! That is $20-40 total at first! But it will go up to as high as $150 if I maintain a good payback record.
Oh joy! A whole $150!!
2. I was told that my "credit limit" will be $8400. Furthermore, and this was the entire crux of the matter, I was told that I was getting a CREDIT CARD, and would be able to use it as such as soon as I paid up front. This did not surprise me, because I do have a reasonable poor credit history right now. But with no interest and no late fees, and with 10% to pay per
month, I thought I could at least take the edge off my creditors and also have something for an emergency.
So... I do not know what to do. The report I found today with the BBB suggests that they are a problem company with others as well. I need the $200 back badly, but I'm guessing that's money I'll never see again. I thought that for some reason I had 3 days to cancel a membership, by law, but I don't know how to cancel. The charge hit on 11/1. If that is the
first of three business days, I'm screwed. If it is three business days AFTER that, I'm on the edge. But the misrepresentation did not become clear until last night.
Do you have any advise? I hope you get this & can reply before it's too late to do anything today per my last paragraph. Otherwise, whatever advise you might have would be helpful.
Thanks much!
Jamie Sweat
jsweat@moody. Edu
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