Clare Henney: Pet Peeve

9:51 PM | | Posted by Clare Henney

If there’s one thing that really gets on my nerves, it’s how the collection agents of credit card companies treat cardholders like me. I often get calls regarding my card payments. While I do pay my bills on time, “on time” usually isn’t as on time as my card companies would want them. Apparently when you pay on the due date, your payment comes in late by their standards. This is because the banks or payment centers you make your card payments to end up posted two to seven days after. This can be frustrating because although these payment centers tell me that the payments will be posted as made on the day when you paid for them, they usually don’t. More often than not, because of this setup, you’d have a collection agent constantly calling you and demanding payment even if you had paid already and were only waiting for it to be posted. One thing I hate about these agents is that they talk down on you. They deny it even if the tone is obvious in their voice. They act like you’re running away from your debts and even if you tell them that you’ve paid, they ask for your payment information like they doubt that you are telling the truth. I’m sure that they are required to ask you for the information but they also have to ask for it nicely and not like they’re daring you to prove that you are paying your bills on time. I almost never lose my cool but when it comes to these people, I just cannot help myself.

Case in point: last month the card company’s collection agent called me to again tell me that I have not made my minimum due payment and that I need to pay before the end of the banking day. I told her that I have paid and she demanded (I say demand because of the tone of the person speaking to me) that I give the complete info for my payment. I told her that I do not have my receipt with me and she says that I should make my payment that day – which got to me because she was obviously implying that I was lying to her. That pissed me off that I lost my cool talking to her. I told her to check her records again and she again told me to make payment.

Later that day I decided to call the collection agency again because the woman told me to call when I made my payment. This time a man answered and told me that I did not have anything on their record that said I had not paid. I told the person on the other line what the woman told me and he apologized. I’m guessing my payment was posted late again and the woman was premature in berating me for being such a bad client. If there’s one thing that this experience taught me it’s that credit cards are bad news. As soon as I’ve paid my installment fees I am closing my card account. I’d do it now but apparently they have additional (and pricey) fees for paying your installment in full (which does not make sense to me) so I need to wait to finish the cycle before I can close the card. After all this, I really don’t want to have anything to do with credit cards. I’ll keep one for emergencies but that’s about it. If you’re thinking about getting a card, my advice would be to use cash instead. It’s not a necessity. Don’t get caught in the vicious cycle!

Photo Source:  Credit Card Venue