Consumer complaint received 2018-01-01
Company: SYNCHRONY FINANCIAL
State: TX
Product: Debt collection
Sub-product: Credit card debt
Issue: Attempts to collect debt not owed
Sub-issue: Debt was paid

Complaint:
Opened an account with JC Penney while making a purchase in the store in order to receive a discount. Total amount came to {$150.00}. This total amount was paid via electronic issuance from my bank XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX/XXXX/XXXX. No other purchases were made on this account. Received a statement from JCPenney showing a balance the next month. My thought was that the payment had not been received at the time of the statement generation. Received another statement the next month that included a late fee on the statement. I contacted JCPenny and indicated that they made a mistake and that payment had been made to them. They requested proof of payment which I provided. There was an issue with the account number however, they assured me that they would be able to locate the payment by name/ dollar/ amount and trace information provided by the bank. They indicated that was probably the issue with the delay of application to my account. They removed the fees and a few months later it happened again ... I repeated the same thing and then they removed the fees and made a notation and submitted the account for research. I provided information again and also hosted a 3-way call with my bank. The bank confirmed the payment. I also provided a copy of my statement showing the money being taken out of my account. About 6 more months went by and I started getting collection calls. To each one I told the representative the same thing and provided the same information. Finally I wrote a letter to the CEO complaining and received a call back from customer service. They took the issue under advisement and promised they would resolve it. The collection calls continued and I tried desperately to get it resolved. By this time it had been over a year and JCPenney/ Synchrony bank was negatively impacting my credit as well another account that I had with Synchrony Bank for my XXXX 's account was directly negatively impacted. I received letters from Synchrony Bank informing me that they were lowering my credit limit from the current {$1200.00} to {$800.00} then it went to {$600.00} and now to {$300.00}. This happened each time I paid down my balance. I went back and forth between my bank and JCPenney/Synchrony bank both holding their positions. XXXX maintaining that the payment was made and accepted by JCPenney/Synchrony and JCP/Sync maintaining that they never received my payment and it was still owed. In XX/XX/XXXX/ XX/XX/XXXX I started received collection calls from XXXX XXXX XXXX indicating that they had ownership of this account and I had a balance of {$430.00}. I explained everything to them and provided the same documentation. They said they would note the account and open an investigation. At the end of XX/XX/XXXX I received a letter from XXXX stating they received a debt validation request for the account with copies of the XXXX statements and indication that the debt is still owed. At this point I am not sure who is at fault, Synchrony or XXXX however, what I am sure of is this money came out of my account and was sent and this has been paid and is not owed.

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