Barclaycard order of payments. Be careful!

SneaksyWhippet

In January I took out a platinum Barclaycard with 0% on balance transfers until 3rd October 2013 and 0% on purchases until 3rd April 2012. The terms and conditions clearly state that payments will go towards the higher interest portion of the debt first, i.e. towards the purchases balance before the balance transfer balance. For the past three months this has been the case; the purchases balance went down following my payments before the BT balance, even when both interest rates were still 0%.

I made a payment of around £80 on 30th March which was taken off my purchases balance as normal. I then made a large payment (£1300 ish) in order to clear the remaining purchase balance before the 0% deal ended. Unfortunately the payment didn't go through until 4th April (the day after the 0% rate ended) so I thought worst case scenario would be that I'd be charged a day of interest. I then made another payment on 10th April for £110 (my usual standing order). These payments together were enough to clear all my purchases balance and a hundred or so off my BT balance.

However on inspecting my statement it emerged that the two payments made after April 3rd had been taken off my BT balance rather than my purchases, and therefore I was being charged interest on my remaining purchases balance at 1.385%.

I phoned customer services to ask why this had happened, given that the order of payments should be purchases before BT. They weren't much help. The guy couldn't understand the problem and just kept saying that any payments over the purchases balance would be taken off the BT balance; he didn't seem to grasp that the payments had bypassed the purchases balance altogether. In the end I gave up with him and called back later.

The second guy I spoke to was a bit more able to understand the issue, but his response was that because the payments were made after the 0% purchase rate had ended, they would go towards the BT instead. I asked him to clarify what this meant for future month's payments and he said future payments would go to purchases first! Eh?! According to him there is a month in the middle (starting when the introductory purchase rate ends), during which any payments will go to the BT balance. Payments before and after this rogue month will go to the purchases balance as it should be. This sounded extremely strange to me so I asked him to direct me to the clause in the terms that explained this. At this point he gave up and put me through to someone else.

I was somewhat frustrated by this point, as I explained the problem from the start to the third person that day. This time I said I was on the verge of canceling the card which may have been the magic words....
He looked into it and completely contradicted what the previous guy had said. He confirmed that it was a mistake by Barclaycard, that the two payments should have been taken off my purchases balance before BT, and that the rogue month business was nonsense. He agreed to adjust my account so that those payments would be used to clear my purchases balance first, refund me the interest I had been charged that month (around £10), and extend my 0% on purchases for an extra two months as a goodwill gesture.

I asked at what point I've be able to verify that the changes had definitely been made; he said it would be on my next statement (middle of May). He was extremely helpful and apologetic and I asked to speak to his supervisor, in order to tell him how happy I was with the service I'd received. His supervisor was pleased with the feedback and hopefully it will encourage the helpful chap to continue to be helpful to others

Has anyone else had this kind of problem? It made me wonder how much it might have happened and gone unnoticed/unresolved, especially if customer services staff have contradictory responses. I will of course be going through my next statement VERY throughly and checking they have put things right.

This is my first time playing the 0%/balance transfer game. Does this sort of thing happen a lot?

Apologies for the long post!

blitzboy

I've had lots of 0% cards and never had any problem to be honest. Well done for getting onto them about it though, you were quite right to.

It always pays to check statements thoroughly, 99.99% of the time all will be fine. But its worth checking for that other 0.01%:)

SneaksyWhippet

Thanks for your reply, Blitzboy. I'm very new to all this and don't want to be caught out again!

molerat

Had all the purchases appeared on a statement as often payments can only be made against statemented balances.

SneaksyWhippet

molerat wrote: »

Had all the purchases appeared on a statement as often payments can only be made against statemented balances.

Yes, the purchases balance had accumulated over a few months and had appeared on previous statements.

SneaksyWhippet

I just thought I'd update this thread in case anyone else is experiencing similar problems.

The promised adjustments and interest refund were NOT present on my May statement. I spoke to them again and (again) they promised it would happend on my next statement. June statement came and again the changes had not been made.

I made a complaint through their secure email system (including a threat to cancel my card) and they soon phoned me. The operator was much more helpful this time and promised the changes would be made, including a goodwill payment of £20 for my trouble. This time it showed up on the statement later that day and I was relieved to have it finally sorted.

I thought the matter was done with, but today I had a call from their complaints department who were still investigating the issue. I spoke to a very nice lady who told me she had listened to recordings of all my calls. She confirmed that several of the people I spoke to were unhelpful, misled me and did not follow through on their promises, and that this issue was being taken further through their discplinary/training procedure. She also said that they have still not been able to get to the bottom of why this glitch happened but apologised profusely. They have credited me with a further £50 for my trouble.

Everything got resolved in the end, with all charges refunded and £70 given as an apology, but it does concern me that this could be happening to other people. If Barclaycard themselves can't even put their finger on what went wrong, I'd say there is a high chance it has happened to others who either haven't noticed (if they are not regular account checkers) or have been fobbed off with incorrect explanations from call centre staff who don't understand the problem.

Just be aware!

CLAPTON

whilst I am not atall surprised that the call centre staff don't understand the problem, it is surprisng that the computer systems don't get it right first time

StuC75

Is it not also the case that Purchases are only free when the Balance has been cleared - e.g. Not to Mix Balance Transfers & Purchases on the Account at the same time. Thats the main reason why I have a Virgin & Mbna card so never mix the usage..

Re Clapton - Statements do make it clear re statemented transactions and statement periods - so all the computer systems do is implement those 'Rules'..

inmypocketnottheirs

CLAPTON wrote: »

whilst I am not atall surprised that the call centre staff don't understand the problem, it is surprisng that the computer systems don't get it right first time

I'd say that the systems are set up so as to create exactly the problems the OP experienced. I would go onto say that staff are briefed to fob customers off. Furthermore I would suggest that even when promises have been made the system fails to implement them on the basis that a large number of customers are deterred from calling again for an umpteenth time.

Well done OP by sticking to your guns and getting a satisfactory outcome.

SneaksyWhippet

StuC75 wrote: »

Is it not also the case that Purchases are only free when the Balance has been cleared - e.g. Not to Mix Balance Transfers & Purchases on the Account at the same time. Thats the main reason why I have a Virgin & Mbna card so never mix the usage..

Re Clapton - Statements do make it clear re statemented transactions and statement periods - so all the computer systems do is implement those 'Rules'..

The issue wasn't simply that I was being charged interest on purchases; it was that I had made a big payment to clear my entire purchases balance before the 0% rate ended (BT rate was also 0% at this time and went on for a lot longer) and they took the payment off the BT balance rather than the P balance.

I wasn't charged any interest on purchases or BT balances while they were both at 0%. It was only when I tried to clear the P balance before the 0% was up that I was charged interest; the balance was wrongly left uncleared and so I was charged interest on it as soon as the 0% rate ended.

Hope that makes sense; it was quite complicated to get my head around!

CLAPTON

inmypocketnottheirs wrote: »

I'd say that the systems are set up so as to create exactly the problems the OP experienced. I would go onto say that staff are briefed to fob customers off. Furthermore I would suggest that even when promises have been made the system fails to implement them on the basis that a large number of customers are deterred from calling again for an umpteenth time.

Well done OP by sticking to your guns and getting a satisfactory outcome.

I would find it unlikely that the computers were deliberately mis-programmed ... not of course because banks are decent ethical businesses but because too many people would know and so could embarrass the bank.