Consumer complaint received 2015-04-20
Company: TD BANK US HOLDING COMPANY
State: DC
Product: Credit card
Issue: Advertising and marketing

Complaint:
This complaint is about the TD Easy Rewards ( 5 % ) card which I applied for late last year. TD 's own marketing and online material tells users the card offers 5 % cash back at grocery stores, among other categories, for the first six months. 

While using the card, I quickly realized that stores traditionally not thought of as purely grocery stores such as Target and XXXX had their transactions posted as " grocery stores '' and thus earning 5 % back. Using this card allowed me to make a large percentage of my transactions, and proportion of daily spending, in a 5 % cash back category. Beginning in XXXX 2015, TD started repeatedly declined and holding up my transactions for review. Payments from my TD checking account were put on hold for days on end, limiting my use of the card. 

After calling customer service multiple times, representatives told me that that my account was put on hold pending fraud reviews. While some holds lasted a week or XXXX, the final " review '' on my account lasted well over a month. During all this time, I had enough available credit on my account to make any of the purchases I wished to make, and even had a positive balance. 

Half way through XXXX, with a credit on my account, I tried to close the account. The credit card would not be any good to me if I could not make purchases on it for weeks at a time while my account was in review. I was told repeatedly by account reps and supervisors that my account could not be closed while it was in review ( my account had a positive credit because of rewards I had redeemed at this time ). 

In early XXXX, I received a letter explaining that I had " unusual and/or excessive purchases and/or payment transactions '' and my account had subsequently been closed. No one at TD could explain how what I had done constituted those terms. 

Rather I believe TD saw that it was losing money off me because I had discovered that ( due to XXXX and Target earning 5 % in cash back, where I made purchases ) that I had been an unprofitable customer. In response, they prevented me from using my card ( declining purchases ) and eventually closed my account, because they did not wish to follow the terms and conditions originally agreed too. It is worth noting XXXX and Target are huge and offer almost anything I could need to purchase making it justifiable that a large amount of money could easily be spent there. 

Therefore, TD is performing a bait & switch, holding my money and credit limit ( and sometimes the payment credits on my account ) hostage while they conduct their reviews. Declining my legitimate purchases represents an unlawful action where the company involved does n't provide limits on a service some people might use more regularly then initially designed. TD offers a 5 % rebate incentive to use their product at certain stores, however, when people actually use the card, TD hides behind fake fraud claims and blocks entire use of the card.Until TD fully discloses any changes to its credit card terms and conditions on the use of the card and any limits involving its rewards categories, then they have no right or reason to block or restrict my legitimate use of the card. TD is only limiting my card usage because they perceived me as spending an 'unusually large ' amount of money in a bonus category and do not wish to honor the 5 % cash back offer they extended to me. 

This ordeal, through no fault of my own, has put a derogatory note on my credit reports, showing that one of my accounts was " closed by issuer. '' This message reflects negatively on my credit report and could cost me in future transactions I under take with other financial institutions.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation