Consumer complaint received 2020-05-24
Company: AMERICAN EXPRESS COMPANY
State: NY
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem when making payments
Sub-issue: Problem during payment process

Complaint:
For last 15 to 20 years same person has managed my American Express [ AMEX ] account and issued checks to pay the billed amounts. Then suddenly, without any warning, that person was inexplicably denied access to have questions answered about a XXXX XXXX discrepancy in bill from American Express.. I was away and not reachable to respond. Because AMEX denied my account manager any access to account and refused to answer questions about the billing discrepancy, the bill could not be paid, and I could not help due to Covid travel restrictions ( I do not use electronic banking or bill paying and do not have on line access to any account or financial resources or the like ). Amex never sent follow up bills and has added impossibly excessive interest and fees that should not have been added, Plus, I am almost never able to use the card for purchases due to an almost constant barrage of " fraud alerts '' that occur for virtually every purchased I try to make with the card. I pay a fee of {$160.00} each year for such awful lack of usability and abuse. 

When I learned of situation, I sent letter to AMEX, on XX/XX/XXXX. I also spoke to several people at AMEX customer service to explain that I could not respond as I was away and did not have access to bills, but that the same account manager that had been paying bills was to continue to have my authorization to serve in that capacity. 

AMEX wrongly told her there is no way for me to have an account manager, yet on XX/XX/XXXX, I got a letter to authorize up to two people as account manager, I have had one problem after another with AMEX, and one of the biggest is that they never 'seem ' to receive even one of the letters I have sent them about these problems. The letters have been sent to the listed address for billing disputes and also to other addresses at AMEX. I discovered on XX/XX/XXXX, that AMEX, true to form, claims never having received my XX/XX/XXXX letter. 

If they did not get the letter, they would not have sent the account manager authorization 1 )  Because AMEX suddenly and without warning or justification, revoked authorization of an account manager who had been managing the account continuously for the past 15 to 20 years, 2 ) refused to provide an account manager of 15 to 20 years, information required to pay those bills, and 3 ) refused to provide the forms or other material that they may require to confirm such authorization.

4 ) Conveyed false information in wrongly stating there is no way for a card holder to appoint an account manager 5 ) Due to Covid converns my ability to be directly involved was very limited, and delayed, but should not have been required anyway 6 ) AMEX has, since XXXX, consistently denied receipt of a single letter I have sent them for billing disputes or any other matter, and did it again with the letter I sent them on XXXX XXXX. It is just not believable that they are not getting these letters! 
AMEX needs to remove all late fees, and interest that have resulted because it, and it alone prevented payment of the bills.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation