I live in CA and I purchased a Suzuki bike with a suzuki credit card in 2006. At least that's what they told me only to find out late it was with HSBC Nevada. Anyway, the promise of a low monthly payment was a closing factor. However, this did not last. The payments began to change and I paid over the minimum payment every month and at the same time every month.
Then it started... Late fees and interest accrued on those lates fees. Seems pretty strange that I make the payment at the same time every month and all of a sudden they're late? Anyway, the payments started going up and up because of late fees etc to the point where I could no longer afford it. I called them and I was told that they could extend it to 10 days out with no fees attached. Not true either. Fees and interest on the fees accrued over those days and it was ridiculous.
Eventually I was behind in my payments and they called and called several times a day with an automated voice saying "we have an important call for you. Please hold". Ok. Who is this? There was no identifier saying who I was supposed to hold for so, thinking it was a sales call (which I hate) I hang up every time. These averaged 7 - 8 times a day! Each from a different unidentified number.
Sometimes I would get calls and an operator would ask if she could speak with me. My wife would ask who was calling and they would simply state their name and not who they were with, so, if I didn't know a Mary or Stephanie then I would refuse the call if I was busy with the kids. If I had know it was HSBC then I would have taken the call.
I was finally, after many attempts, able to get hold of someone saying that I could no longer make my payments and what options were there. A VERY rude person on the other end said "Well you just have to make your payments". I told them I wanted to voluntarily have the bike re-possessed and that's where all the crap started. Several days of harrassing phone calls... Each from a different person and each not knowing that I had already made arrangements for re-possession. Conveniently no one had any notes in the system regarding any of the previous phone calls I had made to them.
After about 3 weeks of this I finally get the paperwork in the mail. It was 1 page and it outlined a type of arrangement. There was a fax number and half address on the page. It also stated that I was to waive any rights I had under the law. (luckily my wife looked into this and noted that we don't need to waive our rights at all). I deleted the right waiver and tried to fax it back to them at the number they provided. The fax number was bogus (all the while interest and late fees are accruing on my account). Since they gave me no number to reach them at I had to wait until they called again... Which they did, 5 times in an hour and again each with the same automated message.
I finally get a new fax number and told them that I do not waive my rights, at which point the operator went from being very rude to flustered and didn't know what to say. I faxed off the paperwork and got a fax confirmation from the fax machine.
In the meantime I received a letter saying that I can extended my payments another 10 days (what???). 2 days later another 5 automated calls in an hour and I hold and hold and hold. Finally an operator (again VERY RUDE) comes on and tells me that she could issue a check over the phone for the amount due. So I tell her that I have already faxed back voluntary re-possession paperwork and asked if anyone had any notes on the system. No they haven't. She then told me that they never received the fax.
I told her we had a fax confirmation and she changed her story to saying that they only received 1 page of the fax. That's all the paperwork was... 1 page. I told her that the fax was only 1 page and if she received that 1 page then she received the whole fax. She then got VERY RUDE again and told me that she was going to make a note in the system to say that they were going to fight me for the full balance because I refused to take their contact number. No one, from any of the calls we had, either offered or gave me a contact phone number. They all told me that it would be on the paperwork but it never was. She hung up without giving us any more information other than the threat. So now we're waiting to see what's going on.
Matt
Mountain House, California
U.S.A.
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