Consumer complaint received 2023-04-09
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: NJ
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem with a purchase shown on your statement
Sub-issue: Credit card company isn't resolving a dispute about a purchase on your statement

Complaint:
On XX/XX/XXXX, my daughter made an authorized payment on my Citi bank card for {$980.00} to be put on a waitlist for concert tickets with XXXX XXXX XXXX. On XX/XX/XXXX, my card was charged and the tickets went through. Originally, I did not recognize this payment as it had been months since my daughter bought these tickets and I am 65 years of age. I called the credit card company mistakenly thinking this was fraud. They gave me a temporary refund of {$980.00} under investigation. After speaking with my daughter, I realized this was our legitimate purchase and called back to have them reverse the credit and cancel the investigation. On XX/XX/XXXX, the {$980.00} was reinstated. 

In XXXX of XXXX, my daughter and I called XXXX XXXXXXXX XXXX  to see where our tickets were. They said that after the initial investigation by our credit card company, our tickets were canceled, and we would no longer be receiving them. Having realized this, we called the credit card company to let them know this, because we had still been paying for these tickets ( plus interest ) for all of these months. 

Citi bank told us to get in touch with XXXX XXXX XXXX. XXXX XXXX XXXX  told us we had to go through our bank. This went back and forth numerous times, and it was absolutely impossible to get a response from Citi Bank. Each time, we were taking through the ten minutes of speaking to a robot before we could speak to a human, since they never gave us a case number or anything of the sort. Each time we spoke to a human, they had NO recollection of anything that happened. No information was taken, and we had to re-explain the entirety of the situation each and every time. Following this, they would then reconnect us to Security, Fraud, Disputes, Customer Service, and Billing - all who had no knowledge of the situation. 

This is where the beginning of months of physical and mental efforts to get our money back for items that we never received began. Citi Bank told us that this item could no longer be refunded or investigated since it already had been, but would other times say the money had already been refunded. Looking at my statement, this money has clearly not been - and we've done the math countless times to prove this. At one point, they made my credit card payments for two months {$0.00} - clearly not taking care of the issue. On XX/XX/XXXX2023, I was refunded {$74.00} in interest, still not being fully paid back, but proving that something is wrong. 

They refuse to give me my money back in full. Additionally, the bank app will not allow us to see statements past XXXX of XXXX, therefor it's nearing impossible to keep track of what has happened. When we ask the bank to see past statements, they tell us they do not keep record of them- which can not possibly be true. 

I have screenshots of my statements, emails, and countless reference numbers now of the events that have unfolded. At this point, it has been nearing a year of psychological stress and physical efforts to get my money back for items that I did not receive. Attached, you can see emails sent back and forth with XXXX XXXX XXXX, ones sent to Citi bank ( that were never answered ), and statements showing in XXXX refunds, then reinstatements, that were never taken away.

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