MBNA Platinum terrible customer service - cancelled account

doublebill

I balance transferred to an MBNA Platinum at the end of last year. With a direct debit only allowing minimum or maximum payment I swapped from this to a monthly standing order for an amount considerably over the minimum in Late January/early February. Having chose the first of the month for payment (one day after the existing direct debit) I was unaware that this would mean payment for the next few months would be considered late (by one day), incur charges and break my promotional interest rate, incurring considerable interest charges.


Foolishly – due to changing jobs and other personal issues beginning in Feb – I only noticed this error myself today…

I was disappointed that the regular standing order – one which would be illogical to set up to be paid one day late every month and therefore obviously created in error - would not be noticed by MBNA and pointed out to me. With the ability to transfer away easily I would have thought keeping customers happy would be a priority and it would have been good customer service for MBNA to get in touch.


Instead, when I called today and spoke to customer service representative I was told that these charges were noted on my monthly electronic statement and therefore had been pointed out to me.Whilst I accept ultimate responsibility, the lack of good customer service or any offer to cancel charges or reinstate my previous promotional rate (despite it being obvious that I was making regular monthly payments above the minimum amount) will result in me transferring my balance to a different provider, closing my account, and not considering MBNA for any financial products in the future.

They do state any late payment will invalidate your 0% rate, but I thought it worth flagging that MBNA don’t budge an inch and are very customer-unfriendly even when it’s very obvious a minor admin error has been made and caused the issue. As if I’d set up a standing order to be consistently one day late, impact my credit rating and incur charges! :mad:

harryfrombarry_2

Well you're the one who made a mistake, if they choose to enforce their terms and conditions, how does that make it bad customer service?

They are merely enforcing what they have already told you that they will enforce.

Pretty simple really.

shortcrust

doublebill wrote: »

I balance transferred to an MBNA Platinum at the end of last year. With a direct debit only allowing minimum or maximum payment I swapped from this to a monthly standing order for an amount considerably over the minimum in Late January/early February. Having chose the first of the month for payment (one day after the existing direct debit) I was unaware that this would mean payment for the next few months would be considered late (by one day), incur charges and break my promotional interest rate, incurring considerable interest charges.


Foolishly – due to changing jobs and other personal issues beginning in Feb – I only noticed this error myself today…

I was disappointed that the regular standing order – one which would be illogical to set up to be paid one day late every month and therefore obviously created in error - would not be noticed by MBNA and pointed out to me. With the ability to transfer away easily I would have thought keeping customers happy would be a priority and it would have been good customer service for MBNA to get in touch.


Instead, when I called today and spoke to customer service representative I was told that these charges were noted on my monthly electronic statement and therefore had been pointed out to me.Whilst I accept ultimate responsibility, the lack of good customer service or any offer to cancel charges or reinstate my previous promotional rate (despite it being obvious that I was making regular monthly payments above the minimum amount) will result in me transferring my balance to a different provider, closing my account, and not considering MBNA for any financial products in the future.

They do state any late payment will invalidate your 0% rate, but I thought it worth flagging that MBNA don’t budge an inch and are very customer-unfriendly even when it’s very obvious a minor admin error has been made and caused the issue. As if I’d set up a standing order to be consistently one day late, impact my credit rating and incur charges! :mad:

But that's exactly what you did, isn't is?! Lenders usually overlook one off mistakes if you ask them nicely, but you let this go on for months. It's hardly a 'minor admin error'.

doublebill

sorry, 'purposely' set up... and yeah, I am aware it was my mistake, but the bad customer experience came when I pointed out that I'd been making regular payments via standing order one day late, that I obviously made a mistake but had been making payments all the same, and that with it being so easy to transfer away, I thought they might have got in touch to point it out to me.

They didn't, which is fair enough, but when I asked if anything could be done they essentially said no, which is odd also as it will result in my leaving and not coming back. Realise that good/bad customer service is subjective, I just thought it a bit weird - I've had much better experiences at Barclaycard, Halifax, Amex... they were more willing to look at specific circumstances and make decisions based on that rather than quote the rules.

MABLE

harryfrombarry wrote: »

Well you're the one who made a mistake, if they choose to enforce their terms and conditions, how does that make it bad customer service?

They are merely enforcing what they have already told you that they will enforce.

Pretty simple really.

I have an MBNA card and have a dd set up for the min payment but clear the balance manually every month and either get them to cancel the dd for that particular month or pay the full amount less the min payment due.

Also it always pay to be nice to Customer Service people as they empowered to make nice things happen. Attitude will get you no where.

YorkshireBoy

doublebill wrote: »

...when I asked if anything could be done they essentially said no...

Essentially? So they did offer something then?...perhaps 1.9% APR going forward?

I've had much better experiences at Barclaycard, Halifax, Amex... they were more willing to look at specific circumstances and make decisions based on that rather than quote the rules.

It seems like you've made a habit of breaching T&Cs. I trust you'll be more careful in future?

Speaking of the future...just because the only options for DD are full and minimum, there's nothing to stop you (with MBNA and others) setting up a SO to run alongside your minimum payment DD...because they'll still take the DD based on the statement value, regardless of any additional payments you make.

You're the second person this week who has reported this type of issue with MBNA, ie transferring a balance and then totally taking your eye off the ball. The other person failed to check their statements for well over a year though, so paid a very high price for their negligence!

Thrugelmir

doublebill wrote: »

I thought they might have got in touch to point it out to me.

How many credit card accounts do you think that they administer?

lynz68

It's your responsibility to check your statements. It amazes me that people set things up and don't even check after the first payment that everything is ok.

A much better way would have been to set up a DD for minimum amount and then make an additional payment that way at least the minimum payment would have been covered.

Attitude when you make these type of calls goes a long way admitting your mistake and a bit of grovelling might have got you a different result.

doublebill

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

Essentially? So they did offer something then?...perhaps 1.9% APR going forward?It seems like you've made a habit of breaching T&Cs. I trust you'll be more careful in future?

Speaking of the future...just because the only options for DD are full and minimum, there's nothing to stop you (with MBNA and others) setting up a SO to run alongside your minimum payment DD...because they'll still take the DD based on the statement value, regardless of any additional payments you make.

You're the second person this week who has reported this type of issue with MBNA, ie transferring a balance and then totally taking your eye off the ball. The other person failed to check their statements for well over a year though, so paid a very high price for their negligence!

...what they didn't offer was to reinstate the promotional rate I had. And you can trust that in thirty years of dealing with credit card companies I've had cause to question them on average once every couple of years. Not sure what you consider to be a habit.

Blimey, clearly I made a mistake, you know this because I admitted in the original post that it was my mistake, but every reply points this out as if I hadn't. And how do you know I had an attitude when speaking to them?! I'm always polite, which has normally resulted in a good customer experience (as acknowledged in my 'habit' of speaking to previous card companies when there's been an issue I wanted to question).

Anyway, glad you've all never made a mistake or had a bad customer experience after admitting as much.

planteria

i sympathise, but i think you have to accept that this is your mistake. using Direct Debits for monthly payments to Balance Transfer cards is standard practice, and for very good reason.. it puts the onus on the card company to handle it.

fwiw i am still not convinced that anything other than 'Minimum Payment by Direct Debit' is needed/beneficial.

and i've found, generally, that MBNA have been good CS-wise over the years. sometimes inflexible. sometimes very flexible and keen to 'deal'. but generally good service-wise, either way.

chattychappy

People are too quick to point to T+Cs as if they are set in stone and people only have themselves to blame when they get hit by penalties for breaking the rules.

Once upon a time penalities were often sent at £25 or even more. These were found to be unlawful. £12 has become a defacto standard because the OFT (the then regulator) said that anything higher would be presumed to be unfair. To be enforceable, penalties are supposed to reflect the cost of the breach to the injured party. The OFT was clear that £12 wouldn't automatically be lawful, it would depend on circumstances. In a world where many have switched to paperless statements and technology is better, I doubt whether even £12 is proportionate.

I think the OP has a strong case where a provider has done nothing more than hit an account with monthly penalties. Did they write any paper letters? Did a human look at the account? Did they try contacting the OP? True they updated an electronic statement - but this wouldn't have cost them £12/month.

There is also an argument (albeit much more tenuous) that cancelling a 0% deal amounts to a disguised form of penalty. Before people start screaming and shouting, consider that in a number of areas recently regulators have decided retrospectively that certain ways of doing business were unlawful which at the time people assumed were OK.

It's up to the OP. But I would certainly challenge the charges. Ask MBNA to justify the charges that were applied by reference to what it cost them. A well written letter would probably trigger a refund.

Perhaps the OP is beyond caring now. But to all those screaming and shouting at what I have written, perhaps they would have told somebody paying £25 penalties a few years ago that there was nothing that could be done about it. Or somebody who had a useless PPI policy that it was their fault. Like it or not, CCs are a highly regulated product and there are sometimes remedies available even when it is "all your own fault".