Cheeky late payment fee

Money_Saving_Kate

I have just checked my Virgin credit card and to my surprise found that I have been charged a £12.00 late payment fee for June. I'm surprised because I paid £100.00 on 7th June (minimum payment was only £5) and my statement shows that it was received (payment was due by 30th June).

I rang Virgin because I thought it must be a mistake and they've said that it's not because I paid it too early - if I'd just paid it a day later it would have not incurred a late payment charge.

I've argued this point with them because my previous statement required a payment by 31st May (which they recevied from me on 16th May) so on this basis I don't see how they can justifiably charge me for late payment when they received payment after 31st May and before 30th June. I'm furious...

All that it seems I can do is write and complain and try and get a refund - has anybody got any useful tips or guidance that I can draw on before writing my letter?

Thanks for taking the time to read this...

K

mojo_jojo

Hang on, so minimum payment date is end of June and you paid on 7th June? What does the statement say? That doesn't make sense as you paid on time.

KTF

Its possible you paid twice in one month depending on the statement date rather than once in each month.

King_Of_Fools

You have to pay once per month between the statement date and the due date. I assume from your description that the June statement was issued around 9th June. It would seem that all you can do is write and try to get them to waive the charge on this occasion.

Money_Saving_Kate

Thanks guys.

I've checked and the statement date was 7th June and the payment was received on 7th June. I do all my banking through the internet so I never look at the paper versions when they arrive. There's certainly no mention of the 7th June date on the internet account pages so I feel a little bit misled by them over that.

StudentSaver_2

You haven't been misled. It's YOUR responsibility to check your statements and the dates on them. It will be clearly stated in your credit agreement that payments are due after the statement has been issued. It looks like the statement hadn't been issued before your payment was made.

You say that you never look at the paper statements sent to you. Your paper statement would have clearly stated all this information. You can't blame Virgin for your lack of interest in their correspondance.

Is this the first late payment you've had recently? I'm the person on the other end of the phone (though not for Virgin) that deals with the LPCs, and if this was clearly a one-off I'd have refunded it there and then.

realaledrinker

Why not set up a min payment DD (only £5) & pay off extra whenever you want, then this situation would never happen