American Express - Unpleasant Rollercoaster Experience

[riotz911]

UPDATE:

A ton of calls later, and more of the same non-sense over and over again.  Finally today, I decide to give it one last try.  I reach US based customer service right away.  He goes to transfer me to Fraud team, and before he does I explain to him my non-stop cycle of nonsense when transferred offshore.  I'm placed on hold forever, but eventually I get Patrick from here in the US. 

I explain my now very long story to him, and proceeds to investigate.  I'm placed on hold for quite some time.  To be fair, there were probably a million redundant notes for him to read.  He comes back on the call, and FINALLY someone who makes some sense.  He explains that its an identity theft concern, but also sees I just verified my identity with a notarized form just 2 weeks prior.  He proceeds to call me back on the number that the verified me told them was my ONLY number.

He proceeds to explain that the ball was dropped, and there was no real verification done on their end and the card was just closed out.  Apologies for the confusion, and overnights me a new card. So hopefully, tomorrow by 11AM I'll have the new card and can put this headache of an application process behind me.

Thank you Patrick @ AMEX Fraud Dept.  The rest of your team was quite frustrating, but you've restored an inkling of faith.

[Existentialist]

I'm glad things were eventually resolved. I was going to suggest that your experience seemed to be an anomaly and that U might want to consider one last attempt @ reconciliation. Sometimes it is a simple matter of getting thru to the right person. Some ppl will intimate that one particular card's CS dept is better than another. They're all flaky. Some more than others but even the best one's hav bad days. To some degree... they all hav issues. Sometimes its a matter of timing. And of course first impressions are important (but shouldnt be used as the sole benchmark). Yes (IMO) the situation seemed out of the norm for Amex but certainly not improbable (obviously). Although as was stated (by CS) seemed more like an issue of the ball being dropped somewhere along the line as opposed to them arbitrarily closing the account right off the bat.

Dont be too jaded cuz honestly this couldve happened with any card issuer. Personally I hav a rule of thumb when it comes to CSRs in general... avoid them unless absolutely necessary and on those occassions when I do make contact just hope for the best. My hope is that this was indeed the anomaly I believe it to be. In any event just glad this particular episode is behind U and now u can move forward to what will hopefully become a more productive relationship. So I s'pose this means your venting wasnt for nothing(lol). Good luck going forward.