Consumer complaint received 2020-06-08
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: FL
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:
CitiCard has recently implemented a new policy that does not allow customers to pay their full bill. This affects all CitiCard card holders. I have been a Citicard customer for many years. This new billing policy needs to be brought to light in that it disregards the billing periods and prevents customers from paying their paper statement in full. Please see attached documents to help explain whats happening. This affects ALL their credit card customers. 

Instead of normal practices where a customer receives a paper statement & can pay the entire bill at the end of the billing period, they are refusing to accept my full payment. They send me a paper statement which clearly sets out the cutoff dates of the beginning & end of the billing period & the amount due for all transactions during that period. For years I have chosen to pay my bill in full online at the end of each billing period. 

The new policy mandates that I can only pay the amount that is on the computer screen at the date & time I want to pay it. However, that balance includes all credits that took place AFTER the close of the billing period shown on my paper statement. Because the computer balance is live, the balance changes in real time thereby creating a continuous discrepancy between my paper statement & the online balance. The computer will not accept the amount due on my paper statement. 

Under the new CitiCard billing policy, if I return and item an item AFTER my billing period has ended, the computer balance immediately shows the credit on the account and calculates a different amount due for the bill Ive already received. Those daily transactions that take place after the billing period belong on the next billing period to appear for the next paper bill. Under the new policy, if I return an item to a vendor anytime after my billing period has ended and then try to pay my bill from my paper statement, even though CitiCard received that credit in a different billing period ( a week into the next bill ) my present paper statement due for prior transactions BEFORE the cutoff date is not longer recognized as valid. 

This new policy of manipulating funds by slipping future credits into prior billing periods may have some sort of financial advantage to them, but its depriving me of my rights as a consumer. I have the right to be accurately billed for each transaction within the billing periods which they set, and they should be required to accept the payment for the billing period which I was billed. If Im billed a specific amount, but only pay a lesser amount each month, my records dont reconcile, because there is no record to justify the discrepancy between the statement & the amount paid. How do I explain that to IRS? 

I keep strict financial records and depend on that paper bill ( which is my only proof of the specific transactions and dollar amounts that support what I owe for a certain period ) to reconcile all accounts. CitiCard refuses to accept my payment in full for my paper bill. Isnt that the purpose of a paper statement? Their computer payment site is specifically set up to only accept what the running balance is as of the day & time I try to pay it. 

Last month, I tried to make a full payment. The computer refused to accept the full amount of $ XXXXand I spent a lot of time trying to enter it. I tried to contact them but after several attempts of being left on hold for more than 15-20 minutes & having the call dropped, I gave up and just clicked to pay the {$43.00} the computer would accept. Unknown to me at the time, the computer didnt even transmit the payment even though it was for the {$43.00} it wanted me to pay. 

Upon receiving my next paper statement I discovered that they included the charge for the full amount of {$98.00} and added late fees, interest and penalties for that prior bill, indicating that they never received my prior payment for and penalized me for not paying on time, but the computer would still not allow a full payment of my current paper bill. Since my current bill is due very soon, I persevered and finally got a human on the phone and spoke to the customer care rep and then a member of the escalation team. They reiterated that I could only pay the amount that shows on the computer on the day and time I pay the bill. They did allow me to pay the {$98.00} over the phone for the prior bill but would not remove the penalty fees and still refused to accept a phone payment or any other form of payment for the full amount of my current statement. They were very adamant that their billing policy supersedes the paper statement. I must pay what the computer reflects and that if I didnt pay what the computer balance shows on the day and time I pay it, I will continue to be charged interest and penalties and there was nothing I could do about it. I then asked if they would accept the amount on the paper bill if I sent a check. They said no, the policy holds. I spoke with the XXXX the Customer Care Rep & then requested a supervisor. I dont remember his name, but he was from the Escalation Team! I was promised that I would get a call from Escalation Team 2 the following Monday or Tuesday - never happened. I tried to call them again to get a payment history, but I was left on hold until it dropped my call. 

My present paper statement due XX/XX/20 is {$290.00} but as you can see on the computer balance at this moment is {$190.00} & the computer will not accept {$290.00}. Time is important to this resolution. I have 3 accounts with this company, which means that until I get this straightened out, I will have to pay them interest and penalties on all 3. This policy puts all customers and their credit ratings at risk. 
Please, please help other customers may not have found out about this yet and wont know where to go for help.!! 

Please feel free to contact me at XXXX or email me XXXX. 

Thank you 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