Consumer complaint received 2020-07-08
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: NY
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: Credit card company isn't resolving a dispute about a purchase on your statement

Complaint:
To Whom It May Concern : XXXX XXXX performed an egregious action and placed an unauthorized charge of {$9000.00} onto my Citibank Costco Visa credit card on XX/XX/XXXX. 

Since then I have been making attempts to dispute this charge, which I believe is absolutely unmerited and quite frankly an act of customer abuse. By accepting the charge, and therefore paying XXXX, not only did Citibank honor their bad faith, but also they have removed my ability to have a fair dispute with XXXX. 

This all started when I reserved a rental car with XXXX through Costco Wholesale Corporation, in the United States, for pickup at XXXX XXXX, in XXXX, on XX/XX/XXXX. My final destination was XXXX an XXXX XXXX. Around XXXX, about 20 kilometers to XXXX , an oncoming car forced me to the side of the narrow XXXX XXXX. The passenger side of the car was scrapped on the guard rail. There was no collision with another vehicle. This was not an intentional action. While there was cosmetic damage to the side of the car, there was no damage to the actual operation of the vehicle. Since that road is extremely narrow, and there was no safe space/shoulder/emergency stopping lane in which to immediately stop the car, I decided to continue driving to my destination. 

Upon reaching my destination, I immediately called the XXXX XXXX office many times, but no one answered the call. I then called a generic customer service line at XXXX to inform them of the accident. The customer service agent did not inform me that I needed to complete a police report. He simply directed me to visit the nearest XXXX/XXXX  branch the next day, since all branches were already closed. The next day, I visited the office in XXXX, where I described the situation to Ms. XXXX XXXX, the customer service agent, including the fact that there was no police report. She informed me that I had purchased full coverage and was not liable for the damages, and proceeded to complete the claim paperwork to exchange the car. The car was immediately exchanged and at no point during the interaction did she inform me that a police report was mandatory to process the insurance claim, otherwise I would have obviously reached out to the police. The agent either failed to perform due diligence by neglecting to inform me of the need of a police report, or was instructed to do so, in bad faith. How can one even file a claim without a police report and not inform the customer of the need for such an important document? 

When the car was returned at the XXXX XXXX, I notified the person that there were two sets of paperwork, because I had had an accident with the first car. She checked the computer, said I was good to go after visually checking the car, and said the car return confirmation would be e-mailed to me. 

Nearly a year later, XXXX placed an arbitrary and unauthorized {$9000.00} charge on my Citibank credit card that I absolutely refuse to pay. The agent in XXXX convinced me to buy their fully comprehensive insurance, at an additional XXXX Euros on top of the reservation cost. By purchasing the insurance, they guaranteed me that I was going to receive full coverage and shouldn't be concerned with anything. 

When I first started disputing this charge, Citibank customer service provided me with an alternate option and encouraged me to open a claim with Citi Benefits to take advantage of the {$50000.00} rental insurance on the Visa card. I wasn't informed about the limited window of time to follow up on the dispute. I was hoping to resolve this matter with Citi Benefits and not engage in a dispute process, but they also turned me down after two months of investigations. I was bounced around for months and received misguided information from customer service everywhere, protecting XXXX and refusing to protect me. 

As mentioned above, Citibank has removed my negotiation power, XXXX has received their arbitrary {$9000.00} and is obviously not responding to my complaints ( since Citibank gave them the money I was disputing ). Therefore, I am left with no recourse other than opening a complaint with your institution. All I see is a joint effort to extort money from people who don't have it to give it to them. Very bad and predatory practices by XXXX and Citibank have created an enormous amount of anxiety for me and my family and a potential ruined credit, on top of all the issues we are already handling due to the COVID-19 pandemic, including potential unstable employment for both my wife and I! 

We are very disappointed at the lack of care and support from Citibank for regular customers, giving preference instead to big corporations. 

I am hereby requesting that you please help to remove the {$9000.00} charge from my credit card, including all late and other fees associated with it. 

Thank you very much!

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