Consumer complaint received 2018-02-28
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: IL
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Fees or interest
Sub-issue: Unexpected increase in interest rate

Complaint:
Following the recent announcements with Citi I decided to do some account research and noticed some irregularities in the APR I was charged on an account over the 18 years that I had my account. This notification is in regards to a Citi Dividend card that I own. I opened the account in XX/XX/XXXX with an interest rate of 8.90 %. Between XX/XX/XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX the rate on that card moved around from 8.90 % to 19.24 % and back down to 14.99 % which is where it was at yearend XX/XX/XXXX. The account then increased in rate to 19.99 % in XX/XX/XXXX without any known reason or notification that I can remember or have record of. I believe the Card Act prohibited banks from increasing the rates as they had done prior to XX/XX/XXXX. In XX/XX/XXXX the account was moved to 29.99 % under something called an " Interest Back '' program where I would receive 10 % back of the interest charged at 29.99 %. Not sure exactly why this occurred but it did. Then, in XX/XX/XXXX the account moved to an APR of 26.99 %, which I am not sure why that rate since the last regular rate I had was 19.99 % in XX/XX/XXXX ( although it was 14.99 % in XX/XX/XXXX and where I believe it should be currently ). The rate remained at 26.99 % until XX/XX/XXXX when it was moved to 29.99 % again for penalty pricing it appears. I don't believe the account was ever more than 60 days past due so it should not have gone into penalty pricing. It has remained in penalty pricing since XX/XX/XXXX ( almost 4 years ). There have been some instances when due to timing of payments processing and late mail that late payments have occurred, but the account has never been more than 60 days past due from the records I have. Late charges have been assessed and paid accordingly. The account has been current for at least 18 months currently, yet the account remains in penalty pricing at 29.99 %. I recently spoke to a customer service representative on XX/XX/XXXX about the penalty pricing and that I did not believe the account should be in penalty pricing of 29.99 % and the representative and the supervisor I spoke to said that it was properly in penalty pricing due to their methodology. This appears to be in violation of the XXXX Card Act rules, which is why I am sharing these details with you. I tried to get this cleared up with Citi, and their customer service did not feel that they had done anything wrong. As I have dug into the account deeper over the past few days I really do not know why the account APR ever increased from 14.99 % which is what it was in XX/XX/XXXX. Citi has continued to increase my credit line to where it is today at {$5900.00} from a starting point of {$1100.00} in XX/XX/XXXX, which would normally be positive feedback but the APR remains much higher than the 14.99 % rate. I do admit I should have looked more closely at the rates on my statements earlier, but I assumed that there were rules in place to prevent it from increasing, and an expectation with Citi that they would not just raise my APR inappropriately. 

I am requesting that I be refunded all interest paid in excess of the 14.99 % rate starting in XX/XX/XXXX, which appears to have been the rate I should have been charged all of these years since XX/XX/XXXX. There is nothing that I know of that should have increased that rate to 19.99 % in XX/XX/XXXX, and then all the way up to 29.99 % at the end of XX/XX/XXXX where it remains today. 

XXXX XXXX

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