Sunday, March 15, 2015

Why I will no longer use Chase bank

Once upon a time I had awesome credit - not anymore. Mostly due to Chase.
Sometime in 2006 Chase sent me a credit card offer - $20,000 credit, 0% until paid off. I should have saved the document. There was no '0% for 24 months' or 18 months or whatever. It was just straight up '0% until paid off'. I even called them to confirm. I should have recorded the call. I already had 3 other credit cards with them - totaling at least $15,000.
Looking back, I believe they intended it to be used for debt consolidation - I bought a motorcycle on it. A 'cash' purchase made negotiation easy, and with it being a credit card, if something were to occur I wouldn't need to meet potentially high monthly payments. I paid off about $10,000 before Chase revoked their offer and started charging me 12% interest.
That was problem #1 - and while it's MOST DEFINITELY their fault for straight up lying about their offer, I should have kept the offer and recorded the verification call.
Problem #2 came when they called me about fraud on a credit card. At this point I was no longer using Chase credit cards, and what I did have was kept in my safe. There was about $50 in iTunes charges. I asked the rep for all the info she could give me in regards to the charges (basically nothing, just 'iTunes' and the dates, no IP Address) - but I scoured my devices and accounts for an indication that possibly I left a credit card active on an account and one of my kid's used it. Nothing. I found no receipts, no purchases, no additional software or music anywhere.
This rep practically accused me of committing fraud. She didn't believe I didn't spend $50 on iTunes. I don't buy music online. I don't buy anything through iTunes because of previous DRM issues. Fortunately it didn't matter - Visa regulations say the customer is always right if there is no receipt.
That's when Chase exacted their revenge. They took all 4 of my Credit Card accounts and 'reviewed' them. They decided my $20,000 credit limit was a 'threat' to them, and dropped it down to $6000. They made similar claims and changes on each of my credit cards. They knocked at least $30,000 from my available credit.
Not a big deal, as I don't use it - right? Wrong. Your debt/credit ratio has a huge impact on your credit rating. These changes knocked 25points of my credit rating. They got their revenge.
In addition - this 'review' is now a yearly occurrence. Every year, as I pay off credit cards that I used to be 'responsbile for myself' (rather than file for bankruptcy) they drop my available credit to just above the current balance.  Lesson learned.

Don't use Chase bank. Go with a local bank/lender that doesn't have a record of lying and crashing the economy.





No comments: