JC Penney Warning~Please read

[Anonymous]

Okay, this post isnt to rant, it is to warn. Evidently, I missed this info somewhere, so I am telling my situation,so that it doesn't happen to anyone else....

If you haven't looked at your JCP account online lately, do so...

I have had an account for approx. 5 years...my payments have always been due on the 3rd..well this month, I paid on the 3rd as usual..then I logged in a few days ago, to see my available credit..and it says a payment is due 11/27..I'm like what? I just paid like I always do, on the 3rd...So I send a message to customer service, thinking maybe it was a glitch....

I sent message on the 25th, as soon as I saw it. I sent them a second message this morning, because they charged me a $35 late fee, since I didnt make another payment by the 27th. They just responded today, which is not like them, I am sure the holiday slowed them down...but the rep informed me that now...

"We recently made a change where your payment due date will always be 23 days after your account bills. The due date is determined by adding 23 days from the current billing date. This change will allow time for you to receive your statement in the mail and make your payment."

So that means, that I had to pay twice this month...which didn't actually help, it actually caused me to default. Had I not logged in, I wouldnt have known it. Nonetheless, the nice lady, did credit the account for the $35 late fee, but of course, now I have to make another payment, of $70....and I am assuming my payments will now be due on the 27th of each month instead of the 3rd then....

anyone else had this issue?

[Anonymous]

I had the same problem this month when I logged on to their website to pay my bill.  My due date was changed from the 26th of the month to the 17th and I was charged a late fee.  I called customer to find out why I was not notified of the due date change and the Rep told me that it I was notified on my September statement they would be changing my due date and it the new date was not suitable for me that I should contact Customer Service. I told the Rep that just looked at the bill and paid what was due and NO the new date was not satisfactory for me.  She changed my due date back to the original date and reversed the late fee. 

[honeybrook1]

Wow-glad I read this...my due date has been changed from the 18th of the month to the 12th.  I would have just went in and paid on the 18th like I always do.  Thanks, OP!

[voidman]

I always check for the due date on each and every bill month after month and note it down on my "Finance Diary" to plan the payment dates.

I never assume due dates. 

[Anonymous]

well, after having 5 years of the same due date, and most months I have the payments preset to pull from my bank account, I never thought, the due date would just randomly change...and I dont even look at the paper bill..i put it right in the trash, because i view all my transactions and payments online. So I never even would have seen that, if it was on the September statement.

[MojaveMoon]

I just checked my statement for the amount due in December; I'm wondering why my due date is the same one that it's always been.

It sounds like I did one thing differently than the rest of you ? As soon as I open a new account, I contact customer service to (among other things) set the due date to one of my choosing.

This is the second monthly statement in a row that I've received. So I'm assuming that if I were going to be affected like the rest of you that I would have been affected by now ?

Message Edited by MojaveMoon on 11-29-2008 11:16 PM

[marty56]

The best way to deal with paying CCCs and infact any debt is to make a spreadsheet where the columns are paycheck date and the rows are each bill.  I get paid bi-weekly so I pay my mortgage with the paycheck closest to the 1st and the other bills with the next payhceck.  I also schedule the payments to be made on payday.

If your CC has online account monitoring, you should check it once a day.  Also you may want to set autopay  up for either the full amount or minimum.

We are all trying improve our credit and these days there really isnt a reason to be late and 1000's of reasons to pay on time. 

[haulingthescoreup]

No one can tell me that it's accidental that so many CCC's have quietly moved due dates to earlier dates, put in a minimal notice, and then started collecting $35 late fees for those who didn't notice.

I've also noticed more banks that will not credit a payment for two days unless you pay $15 for it to be credited that day (HSBC), those that won't credit a payment made on a weekend until the following Monday, and other fun little traps.

Those who keep track of their bills with spreadsheets, finance diaries, and so forth will still need to confirm the dates far more often than once a month, as these due dates now are often changing into moving targets.

[Anonymous]

GEMB did this with all their cards I believe - I have  CareCredit and JCP and both have 'moving target' dues dates now from very set dates.  I am planning on paying off the CareCredit in January or February even though it has 0% until September. Better than chancing a late.  JCP I don't carry a balance on so even if I don't PIF before the statement date (because it moved) I'm still not late.

They also removed any 'opps period'.  If it isn't paid by the due date -  it is late and will be reported as such.

Really makes me not want to use the cards... 

[Anonymous]

Because I always check online and see transactions and payments as they post, I rarely look at any CC statement.  However, when the statement closes I always look at the due date and amount because after having cards for nearly 10 years I've seen the way due dates move around, even on accounts that have never had their due date change. 

I always:

look at the due date and amount when the statement closes because you never know when the CC company will change it.  

Pay my CC's when I get paid, not 1 or 2 days before it's due.  If there's a glitch in a system or a CC decides they want to wait 2-3 days to post a payment, my min. payment's already been paid because I paid when I got paid.

Not that I think it's right for the CC companies to do what they've been doing, changing due dates with little notice, taking longer to post payments, but as consumers, especially in an economy such as this, we need to make sure that if the CC does change a due date or does taking longer to post our payments, we've protected ourselves by making sure we have that info ahead of time.