Citi card (ex-Shell) limit drop and rate hike

Muhasib

At least you all got offered the new card, I got a letter saying I didn't meet the criteria. I would say that I used the card regularly since 2007 and paid off the balance but last year my card number was used by persons unknown who built up a balance (reported immediately) that I was told to leave unpaid which then appeared as a delinquent balance for 4 months.

I then received repeated calls and letters from Citi about the balance and monthly charges until they finally acted to clear the balance after I managed to get a senior executive in London to act instead of the dysfunctional process between Fraud in Derby, Salford Quays and the overseas call centre.

Good luck if you really wish to stay .............

RobCompton

I've just entered a spat with CitiBank over their ex-Shell Platinum Mastercard.

I received a love letter from them telling me that my limit had been reviewed by a person with severe learning difficulties, and would be slashed from the existing £7400 to a paltry £1000.

I contacted their ever-so-helpful off-shore callcentre immediately explaining that I wasn't happy with that as I had been carrying out transactions to the value of around £3000 every month (and clearing it), so £1000 wasn't of any use at all. They said they would look into it and someone would call me back.

About a week or so later, with no call-back, I received my new card, a plain CitiCards Platinum to replace my dog-eared Shell Mastercard, and on the top of the letter, in clear English it says : Your Credit Limit - £7400.
Hussar! they listened, my limit was back where it should be, though the rate had been hiked up to 24.9% from the previous 14.9%

So all was rosy in the garden, until Monday.

I ordered some goods for work, and the transaction was declined. So I called to see what was going on, and the automated system said that I had a balance of £1052 and change, which I though, OK, no problem, then it said that I was £52 over my limit..... eh? I think!

So, another call to parts foreign, and I got the old mumbo-jumbo that I was clearly a bad credit risk, more so than lending a hundred thousand dollars to an unemployed illegal immigrant in New Mexico, and that they couldn't do anything about it. I asked to speak to a manager. I couldn't, nobody was available, but a callback would be placed for me. Sure enough, I pleasant gentleman called me and basically said nothing more than the lowly operative said on Monday. I explained my position, and reminded him that CitiCards made money out of my transactions through merchant fees, even though I may pay the balance off every month, but none of this seemed to wash. He wasn't a manager, he was nothing more than the sacrificial lamb that is offered to try to placate wound-up customers.

I said I wanted to escalate it further, and he obliged by raising a formal complaint on my behalf. I asked when they would call me, and he said that they don't call, they write to me, by letter, in 3-5days.

Re-capping, I had a letter, dated 3rd Feb, telling me that my limit was reduced with immediate effect to £1000. I later had a new card which clearly stated my limit was £7400. I'm no legal expert, but the second letter supercedes the first as I read the law.

I await their response.

I don't hold out much hope to beating these automatons at their script-reading game of pi** off the customer, but I'm going to be as stubborn as them and give it a go!

I have reminded them that they may need to review their customer support procedures, and that they should phone American Express to see how it's supposed to be done!
:money::money::money:

oscardog

The minute they dropped the cashback on the Shell / Citi card ours went in the bin. They had the worst customer service (up against some pretty stiff competition) and the manager call back system was a joke.

We are elsewhere and I would recommend you all follow.

ffacoffipawb

oscardog wrote: »

The minute they dropped the cashback on the Shell / Citi card ours went in the bin. They had the worst customer service (up against some pretty stiff competition) and the manager call back system was a joke.

We are elsewhere and I would recommend you all follow.

I agree 100% with this post.

Let's also hope they don't do to egg money what they have done to the shell mastercard.