I am SO happy that all this happened just around/after the time I switched my daily drivers away from Citi. There are two issues that have ballooned into three issues, maybe more. I WISH I'd kept a record of dates, confersations etc. But you never expect things to go this wrong.
Just after I stopped putting almost all of our expenses on the DC, I got a fraud alert. I don't recall the details but there was some transaction somewhere that wasn't me. So they closed the account and issued new cards. I'm guessing this was mid-February as I was approved for the CSR on 2/8 and was working on the spend bonus so I wasn't devasted that I was losing THE 16 digit number I knew.
Late February, DH had an item stolen that had been purchased on the DC in January so it was covered by the product protection (whatever it's called) benefit of the card. He called in and made the report, they said to get a police report which he hadn't done yet as it happened out of town. He did the police report and was waiting for them to send him the form to attach the receipt, a photo of the object and the police report.
At some point the new cards arrived and before I got them activated my (almost still a) puppy chewed up DH's card, but not mine. I chatted, because I do like to have a record of things...and I'm sure I kept it somewhere...and explained what happened. The rep kept questioning if there were any auto pays etc. on the card. I reminded him that we weren't changing card numbers, it wasn't a stolen/lost card. It's a damaged card, and we just need one new card with the same number for my husband. SEEMED like he got it by the end of chat, but it was a struggle there for a while.
My husband questioned if we'd received the thing from Citi. We both thought snail mail. He called mid-March to ask about the form. The first agent was talking as if we wanted to dispute a charge. We both (he's the AU and somethings they'll talk to him about and some they won't) had to convince the guy on the phone: no, this isn't a dispute, and yes, we've already filed it we're just asking why we haven't gotten the form yet. He finally put us thru to the right department and they said email, not snail mail. They re-sent it (of course it was in my email late Feb and I didn't realize it) and we immediately scanned and sent police report (which we had by now) etc.
I logged on and within a day or two there was a credit for the stolen item, so I figured we were good. This was about the same time I realized the chat guy DID report the chewed up card as lost or stolen and account was closed for the second time.
Left for vacation beginning of april awaiting the arrival of the two new cards. They arrived in our absence. Not happy about the third account, but whatever. I had luckily switched all my auto pays to my FU.
Husband's first day at work after vacation (4/9) he gets a nasty phone call from the place he purchased the stolen item. Citi HAD done a charge back. THAT was the credit we got so quickly. The place was threatening legal action (all kinds of bad customer service there, but that's another story). DH said he'd do what he could to straighten it out AFTER work and he would call them the next day.
He called the number on the Citi email re: product protection. Everytime he entered the current account number, it hung up on him. He then tried the old-old number. He had to try several calls. I actually think he had to call the regular number and get transferred. Citi and they kept insisting that WE'd disputed the item/asked for the chargeback. He calmly explained the situation (a few times). I left to pick up pizza, hoping they wouldn't need to talk to me. When I got back he said he'd JUST gotten off the phone. (30+ minutes more past the time I left). He hoped they had it right now.
The charge back was un-done, re-charged to us (the day the statement cut...naturally). Now we're still waiting for the product protection reimbursement. I think they told DH they take three weeks and at the time of the conversation it was around 3 weeks. I've looked back over the course of writing this and we submitted the documents 3/16.
To top it all off, today I get a myfico alert: An account under dispute has been detected (TU).
I thought about posting this in general credit topics due to the dispute issue/question, especially reading this http://ficoforums.myfico.com/t5/General-Credit-Topics/Account-in-dispute-reported-by-subscriber/m-p/... but I haven't processed that yet and figured I'd share my CC ordeal with the folks on the CC forum first.
I figure we give them until Monday or so before re-contacting if we haven't gotten the credit for the product protection. Do you think I need to do anything with TU?
