Consumer complaint received 2019-11-21
Company: Bread Financial Holdings, Inc.
State: MI
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: Store credit card
Issue: Problem with a purchase shown on your statement
Sub-issue: Credit card company isn't resolving a dispute about a purchase on your statement

Complaint:
We made 12 payments in a row to avoid interest charges on our very expensive sectional which we drove an hour from our home to purchase at XXXX in XXXX XXXX, MI. 

After our online account was set up, we opted in for paperless billing because we are environmentally conscious and prefer to receive bills via email. Please see most recent electronic bill received on XX/XX/XXXX. Nowhere on this bill does it inform us that we must pay our balance in full prior to XX/XX/XXXX to avoid any accrued interest charges. Again, per the bill we were under the impression that if the balance of {$290.00} was paid by the due date on XX/XX/XXXX, then we would not have been charged interest. We have never looked at a statement until today when the first customer service rep, XXXX, asked if we had looked at the statement? I replied with no, we have never looked at a statement prior to today. We receive the monthly bill, go online and make the payment on or before the due date. Furthermore, when we made our last payment on XX/XX/XXXX, the balance showing in my online account showed our balance was {$290.00} not the current balance of {$740.00}. If the balance would have been higher than {$290.00} then we would have called in on that day to resolve. Looking back, we wish we would have not opted in for paperless statements then we would have noticed that the payment was due on XX/XX/XXXX. From customers who are extremely busy with day to day life and pay their bills on time every month we would hope that you can make an exception and remove the finance charges for the following reason : 1. Your electronic bills should include a section informing customers as to when a promotional finance period ends instead of just on the statement. Like I said earlier, we have never looked at a statement until this morning after receiving a bill out of nowhere when we thought our balance was at {$0.00}. If this was the case, then the payment would have been made by XX/XX/XXXX. 

2. Please see attached email notifications sent from Comenity Bank, one on XX/XX/XXXX and one on XX/XX/XXXX. If these email notifications DID NOT show our minimum due, due date, and current balance due ( highlighted in Yellow ), then we naturally would have had to open our statement to view our balance and the promo detail expiration date. This is a deceptive email that does not reflect the overall status our account and should not be included in any correspondence to me or any other customer for that matter. 

3. Again, if Comenity mailed our statement to our house then we would have to open it to see what is inside, right? This is a one step process. So, why does an email notification give me balance and not require me to open my statement? If the highlighted information was not in an email to us then we would have to open the statement to see this information.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation