Consumer complaint received 2023-03-16
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: WI
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Other features, terms, or problems
Sub-issue: Problem with rewards from credit card

Complaint:
We have had a credit card account called the XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX with Citibank for over 30 years. This card offers a 2 % cash rebate on all purchases made in a calendar year. Each monthly statement provides an updated total of the accumulated cash rebate based on the transactions posted since the previous billing cycle. Then, at the end of the XXXX, a XXXX XXXX is posted to the XXXX monthly statement which represents the cumulative total of cash back earned in the previous 12 statement cycles. This practice has been followed for the entire 30 years that we have had this account. In XX/XX/XXXX we were expecting the latest XXXX XXXX in the amount of {$610.00} to be posted to our account. However, when the statement arrived in the mail, we noticed that no cash rebate credit was posted. I contacted Citibank Customer Service to inquire about the missing cash rebate and I was told the the XXXX XXXX XXXX was terminated in XX/XX/XXXX and therefore no credit was going to be posted. I keep meticulous records concerning all of our credit card accounts and I never received any e-mail message or hard copy notification via U.S. Mail regarding such a change. When I told the Customer Service representative that I never received the notification of the change, she told me that it was detailed in a written change of terms notice that was printed on the XXXX XXXX monthly statement. Once again, I keep all of our monthly statements and after reading through the notice, I determined that there was absolutely nothing in those terms that spoke about a change in the XXXX XXXX XXXX. Citibank eventually conceded that they failed to properly notify me about the change in account terms. I told them that I expected to be credited for the entire {$610.00} and they told me that they would review my account and let me know. On the XXXX statement I received a XXXX XXXX of only {$520.00} which is {$89.00} less that what I earned. I contacted Citibank again and complained about the error and they told me to send them a detailed accounting of how I calculated the {$610.00} total. Using the exact same method that Citibank has used for the previous 30 years, I sent them all of my documentation. I then received a letter back simply stating that the XXXX XXXX XXXX has ended and they were not going to issue any additional credits to my account. My reason for filing this complaint is that I feel Citibank has engaged in deceptive and dishonest business practices and also committed violations of the Fair Credit Reporting regulations. Because they failed to properly notify me of the change in terms, I was misled and tricked into continuing to use the credit card with an assumption that I was still earning cash rebates all the way through the end of the year. If I had known the program had ended, I would have stopped using the card immediately ( I have other cash back credit cards that I could have used instead ).

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 monetary relief