Consumer complaint received 2019-04-23
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: CA
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:
The problem is that Citibank has been double charging my minimum payment in addition to large bulk payments that I make on top of the minimum payments due each month. This has been going on for several months since XX/XX/XXXX.

Since I was constantly paying large lump sums to the Citibank Advantage card in addition to the minimum payments ( and since I have 3 other citibank accounts that were also being paid through auto-payment ) I did not realize this double billing was happening until XX/XX/XXXX.

The Citibank advantage card has been taking double the amount owed for the minimum payment since XX/XX/XXXX. I reported this huge problem in XX/XX/XXXXwhen I was double billed for a large payment, then in XX/XX/XXXX I was billed TWICE for a payment of {$4100.00}.

Since almost {$10000.00} CASH was suddenly missing from my bank accounts, I panicked and when I looked through all my transactions on both my XXXX BusinessChecking account and the Citibank Personal Checking account, I saw that the payments were doubled.

I have a supporting spreadsheet which details all of these charges with the amounts & dates and which bank accounts have been charged the two minimum payments, even though I was only aware and only authorized ONE minimum payment be charged each month.

Several times I have told Citibank this was an issue and to fix the problem. They keep saying they are going to, or they are NOT responsible, and the double payments keep being debited form my checking accounts. I tried to skip a payment ( thinking that would help alleviate the issue of getting double debited ) but the one time I did, I got a warning that my payment had NOT been made. So I ended up paying a large lump sum of {$2000.00} to the card, in addition to the double minimum payments due. This is because I am now worried it will affect my credit if I DON'T make a large payment.

Last month, like every month since XX/XX/XXXX, I called Citibank and told them to fix the problem. They transferred me 4 times, and different departments kept telling me they could not address my issue.

Finally I got someone whom I told the entire issue to AGAIN -- and he and I went over the every single double payment charge that I was double billed for, confirming the amount and the date and the credit card the double payment was sent to, on the phone.

This customer service rep the PROMISED me that **CitiCards would be refunding me in full for over {$16000.00} of unauthorized charges. This was to refund me for the EXTRA {$2500.00} I had been billed for unauthorized double/duplicate minimum payments for my CITI THANK YOU credit card. I was told I would get that credited back to my XXXX  business account within 2-5 business days. It finally came into my XXXX  business account on XX/XX/XXXX.

However, the CITI AADVANTAGE Credit Card ALSO had {$13000.00} of duplicate, unauthorized extra minimum payment charges that were debited from my XXXX  Business Checking Account. **I HAVE NOT GOTTEN ANY OF THAT BACK. ** The duplicate/double minimum payment that I DID NOT AUTHORIZE and for which I CAN NOT STOP THE PAYMENT comes directly out of my checking account and is marked as an ACH debit.

That means that CITICARDS is apparently withdrawing an automatically generated check from my bank account with a number but not my original signature. They say that this is authorized every month on a pay by phone option which makes no sense -- I am not getting on a phone to authorize anything and I'm not writing out a check.

CHASE Business checking has recently told me that this is technically CHECK FRAUD.

This is because they are taking a double payment that comes to them in the form of a check -- but that is an " automatic ACH DEBIT in the form of a check which XXXX  itself can not stop, nor can I.

I have told XXXX business checking over and over that I need their help stopping these extra payments via ACH debit. But XXXX has confirmed that they have no control over these ACH DEBITS -- they keep telling me that Citibank must stop pulling these payments out in addition to the auto pay payments that I do see online. But this is where I am getting the run-around : Every time I have talked to Citibank they either tell me that XXXX  is the one to blame or that they will stop taking the second ACH Debit payment -- but they havent stopped or fixed the problem. Every time I call, they have a different excuse. One time it was that the Collections department said I had to go through XXXX. The last time I called, they said " The collecitons department that set the payment up, and who is apparently actually able to stop the extra payment is not here right now. '' The terrible thing is that my life savings is running out fast ; I'm unemployed and need this money desperately to pay my mortgage and stay afloat on my other payments.

Here are a list of the duplicate minimum payment amounts and dates that they have double charged me ; I included large bulk payments as well so that you can see that I am paying well over the minimum amount due as it is before the double payment is taken : DOUBLE / DUPLICATE MINIMUM PAYMENTS TAKEN by CITIBANK Advantage XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX   XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX  XX/XX/XXXX XXXX  XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XX/XX/XXXX XXXX   TOTAL REFUND due = {$13000.00} to my XXXX Business Banking due to UNAUTHORIZED DOUBLE minimum payments that I **DID NOT AUTHORIZE**

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