BMO Card Closed

[Kforce]

No one likes having a card closed, CL lowered, etc.

My complaint is that they were so non professional, not letting card holders know about the closure.

Why not send a text, email, or place a notice in on line message box.  

Simple "Account has been locked", please contact us.

The on line account has no info about it being closed , locked or having any problem. 

Weeks later, you would not know, have not received mail, and the account looks normal on log in.

They might not have a legal obligation, but I find it non professional and rude.

Card user gets to find out from a third party company that a payment failed

With current technology, card users should be notified in some way before or within hours of a card being closed.

[Patient957]

---

@Kforce wrote:

They might not have a legal obligation, but I find it non professional and rude.

---

Terrible for their brand. 

They just spent a lot of money to introduce their brand to many new U.S. markets after taking over Bank of the West.  Now they squander what they gained with this terribly stupid move that seems to have come right from the top.

[Kforce]

My daughters card was closed however mine is still open. (maybe).

Need to find each account pull date and check few time's during the month to make sure

payments are made. Problem is won't know until after it does not happen.

I guess I could not do that and just wait for emails/calls from Spectrum, Dish, or Netflix.

Makes me question keeping or just close it.     

[coldfusion]

---

@Patient957 wrote:

---

  To my knowledge Synchrony has done nothing like this.

---

They did.

When COVID was getting spun up and their rate of defaults took a big leap the federal government required them to increase the size of their financial reserves, and since one of the general criteria governing the minimum size of their financial reserves is the total amount of unsecured credit extended across all cards issued one of the steps Synchrony took was to undertake a bulk purge where cardholders with significant TCL across their Synchrony cards (as in significantly more than $50K, especially if they were approaching $100K or more) and with what Synchrony deemed as minimal activity on those cards were at significant risk of having all their Synchrony accounts simultaneously closed, regardless of payment history with Synchrony and their continued financial health.    They also updated their axiom to view cardholders who requested CLIs across multiple Synchrony cards within a short period as being at increased risk, which also triggered a lot of account closures, but this particular senario was more drawn out affair than the bulk closings of high TCL cardholders.   There were a couple of master threads and a number of one-off threads made here at the time with posts from affected members.

[captseaton]

I was digging around for more information on the recent batch of closures.

I am not the biggest WalletHub fan, but these reviews are something else.

[Patient957]

---

@coldfusion wrote:

---

@Patient957 wrote:

---

  To my knowledge Synchrony has done nothing like this.

---

They did.

When COVID was getting spun up and their rate of defaults took a big leap the federal government required them to increase the size of their financial reserves, and since one of the general criteria governing the minimum size of their financial reserves is the total amount of unsecured credit extended across all cards issued one of the steps Synchrony took was to undertake a bulk purge where cardholders with significant TCL across their Synchrony cards (as in significantly more than $50K, especially if they were approaching $100K or more) and with what Synchrony deemed as minimal activity on those cards were at significant risk of having all their Synchrony accounts simultaneously closed, regardless of payment history with Synchrony and their continued financial health.    They also updated their axiom to view cardholders who requested CLIs across multiple Synchrony cards within a short period as being at increased risk, which also triggered a lot of account closures, but this particular senario was more drawn out affair than the bulk closings of high TCL cardholders.   There were a couple of master threads and a number of one-off threads made here at the time with posts from affected members.

---

Okay, I stand corrected.

[Anonymous]

---

@Kforce wrote:

No one likes having a card closed, CL lowered, etc.

My complaint is that they were so non professional, not letting card holders know about the closure.

Why not send a text, email, or place a notice in on line message box.  

Simple "Account has been locked", please contact us.

The on line account has no info about it being closed, locked or having any problem. 

Weeks later, you would not know, have not received mail, and the account looks normal on log in.

They might not have a legal obligation, but I find it non professional and rude.

Card user gets to find out from a third party company that a payment failed

With current technology, card users should be notified in some way before or within hours of a card being closed.

---

---

@Kforce wrote:

My daughters card was closed however mine is still open. (maybe).

Need to find each account pull date and check few time's during the month to make sure

payments are made. Problem is won't know until after it does not happen.

I guess I could not do that and just wait for emails/calls from Spectrum, Dish, or Netflix.

Makes me question keeping or just close it.     

---

My unsolicited opinion is to close it. I feel both of your posts clearly describe why you should.

[Kforce]

Got the letter USPS, 10 minutes ago.

This is how it starts.

Dear "kforce's daughter",

BMO Bank N.A. ("BMO"), the issuer of MBO credit cards in the US, conducts regular reviews of our customer accounts.  One reason we do this is to identify relationships that may not fit witin our requirements.

This letter is to inform you that after careful consideration, BMO has closed the above account as of March 31,2025, in accordance with the terms of our cardholder agreement with you, which allows us to close your account at any time for any reason.   We are unable to reconsider this decisio.

Following paragraphs are about you still being responsible for charges and payments and to check for recurring charges, etc.

There is a line that says rewards can still be redeemed for 90 days on line, or a number to call.

[CreditCuriosity]

---

@Kforce wrote:

Got the letter USPS, 10 minutes ago.

This is how it starts.

Dear "kforce's daughter",

BMO Bank N.A. ("BMO"), the issuer of MBO credit cards in the US, conducts regular reviews of our customer accounts.  One reason we do this is to identify relationships that may not fit witin our requirements.

This letter is to inform you that after careful consideration, BMO has closed the above account as of March 31,2025, in accordance with the terms of our cardholder agreement with you, which allows us to close your account at any time for any reason.   We are unable to reconsider this decisio.

Following paragraphs are about you still being responsible for charges and payments and to check for recurring charges, etc.

There is a line that says rewards can still be redeemed for 90 days on line, or a number to call.

---

Hmm no reasons at all given other than they can..  Guessing just turmoil in the market and their risk tolerance for certain profiles until things calm down and market stabilize after whatever period of time that might be.  Just a pure guess though.  I know they wanted to expand in the US due to acquiring bank of the west, etc.  Times are a bit different just as mentioned above like covid but different reasons for a bit.

[TrapLine]

@CreditCuriosity 

"Hmm no reasons at all given other than they can.. Guessing just turmoil in the market and their risk tolerance for certain profiles until things calm down and market stabilize after whatever period of time that might be. Just a pure guess though. I know they wanted to expand in the US due to acquiring bank of the west, etc. Times are a bit different just as mentioned above like covid but different reasons for a bit."

Oh to think how close I came to accepting a Bank of the West World MasterCard which they said would migrate to BMO. Confess, my view of how BMO handles the Diners Club cards and runs them on the MasterCard network told me NOT to pursue the mailed paper pre-approval for the card. Glad!