We never had trouble with CitiMortgage for six years, although we also never needed to phone them during that period. This last month has been incredible, and not in a good way.
It began when we enrolled in the Advantage plan for bi-weekly payments. Before our first CitiMortgage monthly statement showed up, three installments had been drawn, and $25 of each went toward a $300 start-up fee. Our CitiMortgage account had received only two of them; FNC Insurance was still holding the third. It dawned on us that the arrangement was just an outside firm pulling an extra $200 per installment and sending one complete payment each month along with $400 more toward the principal. We wondered why we would pay a company to do that.
I rang CitiMortgage. They told me it was unrelated to them and that FNC Insurance was the party to contact, an outside company, as the small print would have told me. They supplied the phone number. When I reached FNC Insurance and said I wanted my policy cancelled, the man agreed readily and faxed over a cancellation notice for me to sign and return. I also wanted the third installment back, since they were still holding it. He assured me it was no problem: sign, return, and they would happily refund it.
Reading the form, I saw wording that lets FNC keep fees not yet collected. I said I refused to sign unless they guaranteed that none of the held third installment would be kept. I also asked for the $75 start-up fees they had already taken, because I no longer wanted the plan. The man advised me to put it in a signed letter of complaint and fax it for review. I did. When I rang back, the same man said they had gone over my letter and would refund my payment in full, minus the $75 start-up fees collected, because we were three installments in. I agreed.
According to him, I only had to sign the cancellation form and mail it back, and a check would be issued immediately. I signed it, and under my signature I wrote that I was not authorizing FNC to deduct any additional fees beyond our prior agreement. On the following day I phoned and was told the check was already mailed. When I asked how much, the agent gave a number that was $300 below what we had agreed. For the next two and a half hours I pleaded with them on the phone and got nowhere, and then I lost my temper, which ended any hope of seeing that $300 again.
Days later, I learned my salary at work had been cut by 25%. A few days after that, CitiMortgage rang wanting to know where my monthly payment was, the very one I was frantically trying to find the money for. I explained to the agent that I had everything but $300 and that FNC would need to be contacted for the remainder. That was hopeless, since CitiMortgage has no clue who that third party is and just describes them as an acquaintance. So now I am out a monthly payment. Great.
Next I was put through to Loan Modification to ask for a smaller payment. The federal minimum standard is a 31% HTI ratio. After I stated my reduced income, they calculated 30.34% and said I did not qualify. My own figures came out near the ceiling at 36.5%. When I asked about the gap, the man had no explanation. A bit more checking showed that his result only holds if the impound account is excluded. I told him federal guidelines include it. He placed me on hold to ask his supervisor, and eventually I spoke with that supervisor. They told me CitiMortgage leaves the impound account out of its calculations and has no obligation to include it.
Also, I asked to have my overdue balance tacked onto the end of the loan, and CitiMortgage flatly refuses that in every case.
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