Credit Card Hell

[xjsjaglvr]

Like most Americans I have a few credit cards, and like many from time to time I keep a balance on them. You may be surprised to learn that though your banks name may appear on the card you are really dealing with a larger commercial servicing entity in some far off state. My credit card was from SUNTRUST BANK though the servicing company was BANKCARD SERVICES and they are located in Delaware. Since I sometimes use them when I travel on business I have pretty high available limits (I could buy a car on them) and regularly send large checks to keep the balances manageable. Last month I sent a check for the entire balance as shown on my statement. Much to my surprise this month I received a bill from them for $17.15. I expected a balance of $0.00. I mean if you are told something cost $100.00 and then when you pay for it they say you owe $5.00 more that would seem a little strange, would it not? I called to find out why this charge was there and was told it was “residual interest.” I replied, “well residual interest doesn’t appear anywhere on my bill.” I then got a lengthy explanation from this voice on the phone that it was an actual charge based on a formula that they use to compute your daily balance and that if I was going to pay my balance in full I should have called first for the correct amount. “Excuse me the balance due on my bill ISN’T the correct amount?” Why call it a balance if it isn’t? Perhaps they should change that to “As near as we can tell this is what you may or may not owe.” Subsequent conference calls to SUNTRUST BANK and the BANKCARD SERVICES supervisor were fruitless. Well the charge is legal I did find out. I won’t argue the point. I sent them a check for the $17.15. I am told there will be no “Residual Interest” on this amount but I don’t trust them. I could pay that one off and it could go on forever. Yes they won this little war, and really it wasn’t a large amount. I however have won the bigger war. I canceled my card with them. I had been a customer since 1995, and gave them a large amount of business. I then looked at my other card and to my delight discovered that BANKCARD SERVICES also handles it. Guess what? I will now pay off that one and cancel it too! Because of the way I was treated this company has lost a longtime customer. I have another card through my credit union that I use for personal stuff. I will now give them all my business. For what was an insignificant amount this company will now lose all of my business. In fact the time they spent dealing with me probably cost them more then $17.15. I hope that they feel it was money well spent.
Jag

[shnen]

Good for you!
It's time we as consumers stood up for being treated fairly amd justly! :):thumbsup:

[WandererInGray]

*nods* Good for you to cancel your card.

However, the residual interest charge is standard procedure.
Interest is gathered by the day, so the second you keep a balance on a card for longer than a billing period, it starts to add up.

*smiles* I'm a long-time sufferer of credit card debt (on my way to have it all paid off though, and now I have *no* cards in my wallet but my debit card, and only two lines of credit that I don't have access to) but I'd like to see if I can give a better explaination than the card companies since I've paid about $200 total in residual interest when I finally managed to pay off and shut down three cards.

Like I said, the second you keep a balance on there for longer than the billing period, it starts to accrue interest. You're going to earn a certain amount of interest on that $50 balance.....but then even if you pay that when you get your bill, what people don't realize is that there is a space of time between when you get your bill and when the billing cycle for the next month starts. *smiles*
By the time you get your bill, you're already several days, even a week into the next billing cycle and that continues up until they get the check from you. So that $50+ is still earning interest up until the point where your check to them clears.

That's where the residual interest comes from, those days inbetween when they send the bill out to you and when it gets paid. *shrugs* Crappy but true...

Paying bills online and ahead of the due date is one way to cut down on that...but you'll still get it a little.

:) I agree though....there's nothing worse than the satisfaction of paying off a bill and then having a bill come the next month for interest owed.....*shakes head*....one more example why credit cards are extremely evil.

[HallsOfAvalon]

I tried getting away from the credit cards myself and have been doing rather well. The thing I did was got rid of everything, and now only have a debit card..... the kind with the MasterCard/Visa logo on it. I was doing fine until I sold my house and wanted to by a new laptop over Ebay.

The problem with these cards is that they have a VERY small maxium amount you can charge everyday. I was having a problem buying a laptop for $700, when I had a balance in the bank of over $75,000. So, I had to call them up and almost beg them to increase the limit for a couple of days. After making like 5 calls, I was able to increase the limit for 12 hours. I don't understand why they would set the limit down so low.

Anyways, what you can do to avoid this is have acounts at mutiple banks, and get several cards.

[WandererInGray]

*smiles* Because debit cards don't have the same amount of fraud protection that credit cards do, Avalon.

They do that so that someone can't bleed your account dry if you lose/they steal your debit card.

Frustrating though, when it's *you* trying to buy something.

[Yvonne Belisle]

With Ebay you can contact the seller and tell them you are using a debit card with a dailly limit and make multiple payments. You can also pay an amount into paypal in advance that you can use fpr purchases. We only use a debit card as well and have no credit cards.

[HallsOfAvalon]

Long story, but I couldn't use PayPal for this. I wish I would have known about the multiple payments before. Hehehe, but it's over now. We live, we learn..... Such is life.

[flar7]

also, its not just if debit card is stolen, but if you are being forced
to wipe out account. Or family member has card and decides to
buy something big! Debit cards suck and yet are handy. If you
I just try to use checks for the checking account. Almost everyone
takes them and never have the trouble they show on tv with them. Unless you have a photo id debit card theft is gonna be a
problem, and maybe still then. I get so mad in stores when I use
a charge card of any type and they dont ask for ID!!:mad: They
are basically saying, we dont care if its your card or not! and they
dont.:(

[Mythrel]

credit cards have almost become a necessary evil anymore...I hate the fact that I have a credit card and a debit card but you can't seem to live without them anymore...oh well, keep the balances low and try not to get into too much debt...