Consumer complaint received 2022-06-10
Company: JPMORGAN CHASE & CO.
State: MD
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem with a purchase shown on your statement
Sub-issue: Card was charged for something you did not purchase with the card

Complaint:
Chase has frozen my XXXX XXXX credit card for no good reason and is taking longer than it should investigating CFPB complaint # XXXX about it. 

As a result, I have had to use my Chase Freedom card with fewer rewards. However, I have called numerous times about many unauthorized charges that Chase will not credit. This week alone, I called 2-3 times about an authorized XXXX charge XXXX It is difficult to get a live representative and the automated system Chase uses wastes inordinate amounts of time. For example, the robot asks me repeatedly whenever I call XXXX to try to reach someone about this card to enter the last 4 digits of the credit card. I have to do this twice before it then asks me to enter the entire 16 digits of the card number because the first 2 times with only 4 digits results in the robot saying it does not recognize the card. If so, why does Chase waste so much time asking for it twice before having me enter 16 digits for the third time? There is no answer to this question other than Chase credit cards poor operations in which it pushes the expense of a workable robot or more humans to answer telephones, onto its customers. Furthermore, it uses its habitual dysfunction as a deterrent against customer contact, requests for credits for fraudulent charges and complaints about the inordinate difficulty of protecting oneself from Chases automated predations. Yet it persists in perpetuity with these ruses because it can ; nothing forces it to operate reasonably and fairly. 

But these tactics dont stop there. The first time I called this week after I got a one-way-only email and one-way-only text message ( otherwise known as hit-and-run messaging ) saying that my XXXX order that I did not order was on its way, XXXX representative told me that it would not credit the charge, I would have to call back after it posted which happened within a day or less. Chase claims to record telephone calls, retaining and using voice recognition against my wishes and in violation of my privacy. In typical fashion, Chase wants it both ways for its convenience while treating its customers unfairly. Given its stash of unauthorized voice recordings, why am I forced to report illicit activity on my credit card multiple times, if not to buy Chase more time and put off talking to its angry, abused customers while forcing them to pay padded accounts so that it can enjoy the windfall while it investigates what it should not do to begin with? Isnt it illegal to record someone without his or her permission? Chase does so routinely. I did not place an order with XXXX and could not even sign into its website the last time I tried, which is required in order to place any online order from it. Since lots of companies get away with it, XXXX is playing a frequent corporate hit-and-run game by having no telephone numbers, anywhere, where anyone can be reached about its dysfunctional website. If you can find a telephone number for a local XXXX, the manager typically says he or she has nothing to do with the website and can not correct any mistakes of this gargantuan, unmanageable and unmanaged company. In keeping with its deliberate hit and run tactics ( aka, move fast, break things, before they catch us ), when I replied angrily to the unwanted email from XXXX, it bounced, confirming its one-way push credentials, predation, using a credit card I have repeatedly told it, it does NOT have permission to retain or store in its files, anywhere. Yet it continues to hold my credit card info captive and hold on for dear life because no agency of the government is demanding that it stop ; why? I am so sorry for these corporate thieves who inflict themselves on the public and their customers with the de facto blessing of government. 

The second time I called the above number for this credit card in the last few days, after more wasted time getting past Chases robot, I identified several false charges on my account to a live representative. I spoke in great detail and provided very specific information about the false charges. Towards the end, the rep told me I would have to repeat them, again, some for the 3rd and 4th time, to someone else. At that point, I told him he would have to use the recorded call to get the details and that I expected credits for charges that I told him were not mine. Of course, Chase will try to squirm out of granting credits for unauthorized charges, so now I have to spend more time writing this report. 

Several charges that are not mine include the XXXX charge for {$44.00} which posted very recently ; an XXXX charge from XX/XX/XXXX for {$87.00} ; XXXX charges on XX/XX/XXXX for {$45.00} ; on XX/XX/XXXX for {$15.00} ; on XX/XX/XXXX for {$330.00}. 

This is at the least the 3rd or 4th time that I have called about the {$330.00} charge which is a duplicate charge on XX/XX/XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX. The first time I ordered these lights, I got a nearly immediate tracking notification that said the order would not be sent because it was undeliverable or some other non-sense. This tracking information remained in the notes for the order for weeks to a month or more. Yet when I checked the information for order # XXXX yesterday, no tracking information whatsoever was attached to this order, including, tellingly, no indication whatsoever that it was ever shipped, much less delivered and certainly there was no proof of delivery. Obviously, someone ( or somethingbad HAL ) deleted the previous information and is free to manipulate the shipping and tracking information that appears and disappears in ephemeral fashion on XXXX website, which is how a great deal of fraud by XXXX is occurring. I have reported this before to the FTC, but it should be a well known fact by now that XXXX falsifies shipping and tracking information and frequently claims delivery of items that simply vanish without proof of delivery and its fraudulent charges often entail falsified shipping information. On the basis of the shipping notice that appeared in early XXXX on the day that I first placed the order, or very shortly thereafter, which announced that what Id ordered would not and could not be sent, I placed a second order for the same thing on XX/XX/XXXX. As I recall, the shipping info from the first, XX/XX/XXXX order appeared so quickly I thought it was a mistake and waited a day before placing the order again ; at that time, tracking information for the first order still said that it would not be sent and could not be sent. Now Chase is trying, yet again, to charge double for this. I will not pay double for something an anonymous, unaccountable actor, claimed would be sent only once, then tried to delete evidence of the deception ( the tracking info ), and charge twice for it. I reported this saga to Chase the first time I denied the duplicate charge and did so again today because Chase is trying to charge me a third time for the same item ; it is showing up as a rebill, but it is pure theft, a deceptive, unfair, abusive and predatory action by Chase and its business partner, XXXX. It is much more profitable for Chase to rip off individual consumers than to deny business to XXXX. 

Recent XXXX charges that are legitimate on this card include : {$13.00} on XX/XX/XXXX ; {$16.00} on XX/XX/XXXX ; {$37.00} on XX/XX/XXXX ; {$79.00} on XX/XX/XXXX. Aside from these, I do not recognize any other charges that appear as XXXX charges on this credit card at least since XXXX. Although I have watched some videos through XXXX XXXX, they are supposed to be free through XXXX membership and/or through XXXX membership. Furthermore, there is no way to identify any of several arbitrary charges on this card that originate with XXXX, so there is no way to know what may be legitimate or not, what may be more duplicate, triplicate, or just mystery charges, as all of these distinguish the pattern of XXXX charges I just cited. I have no idea what many of the previously cited charges are supposed to be for because they are simply false charges. 

The CFPB needs to monitor Chases Freedom card closely. It needs to force it to issue multiple credits in the hundreds of dollars for all of the phony charges it is trying to push onto me. It needs to require Chase to instantly credit any charges it tries to post that are simply unidentifiable on this card and sanction Chase for its habitual, repeat offenses of the same kind and reduce the number of credit card accounts it is allowed to have at any one time, since it obviously can not handle what it has but simply tries to push false, unauthorized charges onto customers, most of whom do not have time to get through the multiple layers of resistance Chase has to even speak to its customers, let alone act fairly, reasonably and in good faith. Sanctions should be placed on this credit card according to those described in the aforementioned previous CFPB complaint about another credit card, and immediate credits should be placed on my account so that Chases interminable investigations for acts it should not have committed to begin with, do not become yet another excuse for this credit card to artificially inflate its earnings for any one period.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation