And You Wonder Why......

Banks don’t understand why people don’t trust their money handling skills. Not even including things like the bailout, there are plenty of other reasons. Case in point:

18 months ago I called Chase and asked what my balance was on this card. I was told the exact amount as of that day, somewhere in the $4,300 range. I make a payment for the full amount right then, to the CS representative and cancelled my card. Two months later, I get a bill for $1.46 from them. Now, you are thinking “Eh.....$1.46 isn’t that big of a deal.” and you are correct. It isn’t. At face value.

The problem is that if they sent ALL of their customers a bill for an extra $1.46 and they all paid it, that’s a lot of money. For nothing. I called them and I asked about it. She first told me that she had no idea and then came up with it was the interest that had accrued between the time I got my balance and made the payment.

“Really?” I ask. “$1.46 in 8 seconds?”

“Yes sir” she says. “Would you like to make a payment over the phone at no charge?”

I explain to her that I would not, in fact, be making a payment over the phone at no charge and that she could, in fact, stick the $1.46 (in pennies) up her ass.

Well, I may not have said that last part, but I was thinking it. I declined to make the payment and told her that I wasn’t paying it. Every month since then, Chase has spent money to print out 4 pages of statements, ads, and information. They have spent money on an envelope to put the bill in. They have spent money to mail it to my house. All for $1.46. This will go on forever. They will never go to collections on $1.46. Every month it says the past due amount is $0.00. They are doing that so that collections is never triggered.

So this is it. For the rest of my life, Chase will spend thousands of dollars sending me a bill for $1.46 that I am clearly not going to pay.

Is it really any wonder why we had to bail out the banks? This is a drop in the bucket compared to the waste that is going on at Chase on a daily basis, I’m sure.

A drop in the bucket but man, is it annoying.

$1.46 in pennies, Chase......you know what you can do with it.