Up Yours (the one about the credit card)

After several days of not really posting anything, here I am posting a vindictive post.

Well can you blame me? This ****bank collections officer woke me up, and threatened that if I don't pay my bills, the bills would get bigger every single day. This is not a nightmare, this is real life. Fuck you, I woke up with a headache because of you, and your stupid company that doesn't coordinate between your call center and your collection agency. I have explained my side to several people from your company at several times already, and no one has really helped me. Instead they send people to call me up to pay, and I don't think I want to pay.

Okay, let me calm down and start from the beginning.

Two years ago, I had a ****bank Clear Card. (Which by the way I stopped using because of an embarrassing incident at a restaurant where it was rejected. Turns out when I buy something on installment, the card charges everything to my credit limit. Thus sobrang lumiit yung "available" credit ko, rendering the card almost useless. I had to step out of the resto, drive to another place where it had ATMs, withdraw money, and return to the resto to pay the bill.)

Then a year after that, the credit company offered me a ****bank Visa as well, with the first year annual fee waived. I didn't really want or need another card, I tried to refuse but the persistent customer agent said, "Well, it's free, and you can cancel it after the first year."

So fine. I got the card. One year passed. I actually forgot about the card, it's still nestled somewhere in the envelope that they sent it, somewhere within the messy papers strewn about in my room. I did not get a billing statement. I just got a call one day, that hey, I owe them the 1,200 pesos annual fee. So I said, I wanted to cancel the card. So they asked me for the last three digits on the back of the card to authorize a cancellation, but I could not find the card. So the customer service agent said, "I'll waive your annual fee, just call back with the card's last three digits."

And a month went by. I went out of town, came back into town. Then while riding a jeepney the bank's collection agency called me. Bayaran ko na raw utang ko. Sabi ko lang, teka, nasa jeep ako, baka manakawan ako no. Pero na-explain ko naman na winaive na raw yung annual fee ko. Sige daw, tatawag na lang ulit sya. Hindi sya tumawag.

Then I got a letter from ****bank asking me to pay my overdue bills. Naisip ko, ang galing ng ****bank...hindi nya mahanap yung address ko para bigyan ako ng monthly statement pero heto nakarating yung demand letter nila. All throughout I was expecting my bill to be 1,200 -- the annual fee for the card.

Tapos finally I get the Sept 1, 2005 billing statement -- and I supposedly owe the bank 3,204.97 pesos! For a card that I didn't use, for a card that's still in its delivery envelope which I can't find at home. Shet, pano naging 3,204.97 ang 1,200??? Para ba yan yung 90 pesos na nakalimutan ko bayaran dun sa isang card nila, at naging 390 pesos nung next billing statement??? (Ridiculous if you ask me)

Well it turns out aside from billing me the 1,200 pesos annual fee, they double billed me. They billed me the 1,200 TWICE, plus added the accrued interest (300 pesos every month), plus they even billed me for a credit guard protection which I didn't even opt in for.

I tried to have the card cancelled again, but they couldn't cancel it since I don't have the card's last three digits. What I could do daw, is have the card blocked and reported as stolen, then they would issue me a new card, but I would still have to pay at least the minimum amount due. WATTT?

So I tried to find the card at home. I haven't found it yet. Then I fell asleep last night with a bum stomach -- I had really bad stomach cramps and I even skipped rowing this morning because my stomach still hurts a bit. At 8:30 this morning, I was still sleeping when my ringing cellphone woke me up. It's the fucking collection agency of the fucking bank. He says I have to pay my bill N-O-W, because interest is accruing everyday. I have to call the customer hotline N-O-W, because otherwise my credit history will be ugly. I told the guy, in my still-sleepy voice, that I already had the card cancelled, that they offered to waive the annual fee to begin with, but I just couldn't find the card right now. And he told me that this non-payment would affect my other ****bank account (na cancelled na, but I guess he wasn't informed). I woke up with a freaking headache.

First of all, hindi ba nya napansin na kakagising ko lang? Hello??? Sa totoo lang naiyak ako dun ha, siguro dahil ang sama sama sama ng gising ko.

Called the customer hotline to have the card reported as lost. But since I owe the bank something, I'd have to pay first before they can issue me a new card, which I'll cancel anyway (for all this hassle, it's not worth it). But I don't really want to pay a 1,200 annual fee for a card I never used and which they said they would waive the annual fee for. So I just insisted to have the card cancelled. To make a long story short, there was no account closure officers available (yeah but they had collection agency agents readily available). They would just have to call me up again, in the next 3-5 business days. Wow.

Really I have friends who work in this bank, and I don't really want to think of this bank as the monster, but right now I do. They have several agencies to respond to customers, but I don't really feel that customer is king here. I never felt that, even when I had good credit standing with their bank. Like, I already have two cards from their bank, and there they assign several customer agents to call me up to offer me even more or similar cards from their bank. I know they outsource their services, so they wouldn't know the whole picture, but that's no excuse. As a customer, I feel trampled upon. And used.

So if ever anyone asks me about the cons of customer service outsourcing -- it's this: the outsourced agencies don't communicate with each other. There's no personalization of customer service, the customer gets asked the same things over and over again by different people. But then again, maybe I'm just being treated that way because hey, I'm not rich enough for their bank. The funny thing is, there are still some agents that call me up to offer me the bank's credit cards.

Sigh.