Consumer complaint received 2021-03-08
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: IL
Product: Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports
Sub-product: Credit reporting
Issue: Incorrect information on your report
Sub-issue: Account information incorrect

Complaint:
I had a perfect payment history across all my tradelines prior to this issue, but a Macy 's / Citibank credit account was reported unjustly as 30 days past due beginning in XX/XX/XXXX. This caused my credit score to drop by 50+ points overnight.

I called Macy 's in XX/XX/XXXX and had the issue corrected, allowing my score to return to closer to its previous level ( ~800 ). Then, just as I applied for a mortgage refinance in XX/XX/XXXX, this Macy 's / Citibank late payment began appearing on my account again, lowering my score by 50 points in an instant.

After calling and explaining the situation to Macy 's / Citibank customer service and credit specialist team, multiple team members rudely explained to me that the only way they could remove the delinquency from my payment history was if I was in a FEMA affected zip code during the month, if there was returned mail on my account, or if there was a bank issue where they applied my payment to the wrong account. 

The root cause of the issue is that I had my account set up for auto pay to make full payment on my balance of {$54.00} on XX/XX/XXXX. However, the auto pay was mistakenly set to an old bank account I had closed. Macy 's / Citibank accepted payment from this old account on XX/XX/XXXX and delivered a statement generated on XX/XX/XXXX indicating the payment was successful and showed a {$0.00} balance ( see attachment ). After noticing the {$0.00} balance, I assumed there was no issue. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, Macy 's / Citibank reversed my payment of {$54.00}, yet provided no notification that the balance had been added back to my account due to a reversal. They DID however proceed to tack on a {$27.00} late charge and other fees within the same statement cycle on XX/XX/XXXX. Macy 's / Citibank also claimed to have sent me a paper statement at some point over this period, but I received no correspondence at my address on file during this period, likely due to USPS mail delays in my city of residence XXXX during this time. I also moved to a new home in XX/XX/XXXX and the mail likely was delivered to my old address and not returned to Macy 's / Citibank. I learned my account was being reported as delinquent by the sudden drop in my credit score on XX/XX/XXXX. 

When I noticed my score had dropped, I immediately made a full payment of {$87.00} ( including late fee ) on the same day XX/XX/XXXX to bring my account current and have made any additional transactions with Macy 's. I also was forced to make another payment of {$2.00} on XX/XX/XXXX which was a result of accrued interest on a balance I expected had previously been paid off. None of the attached correspondence made it to my correct address on record as of XX/XX/XXXX. 

Despite being a customer in good standing at all points up to this bank payment error, Macy 's / Citibank has showed no willingness to correct the delinquent mark and resulting in significant damaged to my credit score. The punishment does not fit the circumstance considering Macy 's / Citibank did not make any prompt attempts to notify me that my payment was reversed after previously representing my account as {$0.00} balance.

Company public response: Company has responded to the consumer and the CFPB and chooses not to provide a public response
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation