Consumer complaint received 2017-03-10
Company: Bread Financial Holdings, Inc.
State: GA
Product: Credit card
Issue: Billing disputes

Complaint:
1. I was given misinformation regarding Comenity Bank/Pottery Barn Credit Card 's policies and practices regarding the reallocation of payments from the general to promotional plan balance. In a conversation with customer service on XX/XX/XXXX, I was told there was no time limit to how far back a customer to go to re-allocate a payment, so I thought I surely had plenty of opportunity to reallocate previous payments to cover my Promotional Plan balances 1 and 2 before their expiration in XX/XX/XXXX. For example, I had made payments on XX/XX/XXXX, and XX/XX/XXXX, {$1300.00} and {$1000.00}, respectively, which were both well above the minimum payment amounts of apx. {$200.00} at that time. If allowed to reallocate surplus payment amounts ( amounts above the minimum ) like promised, I would have had more than enough money to pay off the balances on Promotion Plans 1 and 2 before they expired, which were {$34.00} and {$480.00}. However, when I called several weeks before the two plans expired to reallocate past payment amounts, I was told there was only a 30 day window in which to reallocate payments - I no longer knew who to believe but they refused to reallocate. On XX/XX/XXXX, I was charged {$180.00} in back interest. I am disputing this interest, because it would not have accrued had I been able to reallocate my payments as promised ; or, if I had not been given misinformation and had budgeted to make additional payments accordingly. 
On or around XX/XX/XXXX, in an attempt to avoid those charges from accruing, I contacted XXXX ( Pottery Barn ) corporate office, and spoke with XXXX, who stated by email, " My sincere apology for the continued issues with Comenity Bank. As previously mentioned we have no way to directly intervene with concerns regarding your banking credit card, but I have sent this to our Corporate Comenity Bank contacts as an urgent request for Comenity Bank leadership to contact you directly to provide issue resolution. I will update you directly if I am provided with update but as we are not able to take role as intermediary, I may not be contacted with update. '' However, I received no communication from Comenity. 
On today, XX/XX/XXXX, I contacted Comenity to attempt to dispute the finance charge directly. I spoke with XXXX, whose last four digits of ID # are XXXX, who credited back only {$60.00}. He accepted that I was given misinformation, but felt that {$60.00} was appropriate because he stated I should 've questioned the misinformation when I received it because it had contradicted the information I had previously been given. " At that point, when he told you there was no time limit, I definitely would have asked more questions. '' Apparently, Comenity 's policy is not to stand by their statements and to require customers to second guess what they 're told. 
2. There is no purpose of the 30 day window, except to make it more difficult for customers to pay back their promotional balances. All of this seems set up to make money for Comenity Bank. 
3. Managing these balances had been consumed several hours of my life, requiring me to call in every month to reallocate payments. The amount of time one has to spend on this, and the lack of transparency and flexibility is unreasonable and should be changed by the company. 
4. In addition, Comenity continues to have glitches causing misinformation to print on my statement every month regarding the " Original Purchase Amount '' of the Promotional Plan balances. For example, on plan 1, the original amount, as shown in my XX/XX/XXXX statement, was {$1100.00} ; however, on my XX/XX/XXXX, statement, the original amount was listed as {$380.00}. On Plan 2, the original amount, as shown in XX/XX/XXXX, was {$890.00}, but in XX/XX/XXXX, the original amount is listed as {$410.00}. The original amount should not change - it is a static amount representing a starting balance.

Company response to consumer: Closed with monetary relief