Consumer complaint received 2024-04-02
Product: Credit card — General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem when making payments — Problem during payment process
Company: CITIBANK, N.A. (GA)

As a prologue to this matter, I habitually pay off all of my credit card balances, in full, every month in order to avoid the usurious 20.49 % rate that CITI charges on the unpaid balance. Their payment processing department has been unable to credit my account with my payments for a number of months. I dont know if this is ineptitude, indifference, or just plain greed on the part of CITI management policies. Certainly their interest rates speak to the latter. 

On Tuesday morning XX/XX/XXXX, XX/XX/XXXX, I talked to Citibank for slightly over XXXX minutes. I did escalate it to the supervisor level. The XXXX ladies with whom I talked were very cordial. CITI Bank is still having trouble finding the payment for {$6200.00} which was made in XX/XX/XXXX as well as the payment for {$2700.00} which was made on XXXX XX/XX/XXXX. I have furnished CITI several hard copies of these and all of my other payments with dates, amounts, and confirmation numbers from the XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX that these sums have indeed been paid to CITI on the dates indicated. The total amount that CITI can not find and credit to my account is, thus far, {$8900.00}. While that is relatively nothing to CITI, it is a not insignificant amount of money to me. 

Since CITI was seemingly unable to credit my payments, I signed up for autopay to pay for the monthly balance, thinking this would be a good thing, as surely the XXXX payments would be resolved within a matter of a few days. Wrong. I also paid them {$1000.00} on XX/XX/XXXX which was the total of purchases I made for this billing period.. Then they auto paid themselves, the lofty some of {$2600.00} as an auto pay, which is definitely not what I intended. As a matter of fact, the lady with whom I spoke on XXXX XXXX said that with the payment of {$1000.00} CITI would owe me money. There was no explanation of this huge withdrawal from my account ; CITI just did it without my prior knowledge. The supervisor with whom I spoke said that she would escalate the communication to level of a personal message to the investigation department. I maintain that the investigations department was certainly dragging their feet, as the {$2700.00} payment was made on XXXX XX/XX/XXXX, and they still havent been able to find it. In spite of the fact that I give them confirmation numbers. Apparently, in indifferent that the payment was made in full, and proof furnished to CITI, they still were unable to credit the payment because Citibank canceled the conditional credit for that amount. Isnt automation great? 

Further, on the statement that is dated XXXX XX/XX/XXXX I was charged {$94.00} interest plus a {$30.00} late charge, both of which are totally unjustified because my XXXX payment was made with an electronic transfer on XX/XX/XXXX ; well in advance of any arbitrary date for imposition of interest, penalty or late fee, which was XX/XX/XXXX. This was reversed, however, on the statement that was dated XX/XX/XXXX. Having said that, CITI apparently re-imposed the penalty and interest on the statement dated XXXX XX/XX/XXXX ( which I only received XXXX days ago ) as there is a charge of {$120.00} for interest for this period and a total late charge for the year of {$240.00}. That is totally unjustified and should be withdrawn immediately. 

Also, on the statement dated XX/XX/XXXX, I show that I made a payment of {$1000.00} on XX/XX/XXXX. I had total purchases of {$470.00} on this statement. Yet Citibank managed to charge me the sum of {$120.00} for interest on XX/XX/XXXX. I simply do not comprehend why their XXXX Department can not straighten the matter out. I have furnished them with the payment amount, the date, and the confirmation number from the XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX. As I said previously, perhaps they are indifferent, stupid or I might even suggest the possibility of some potential white collar crime It cant be that difficult to match a payment with an account. Maybe they dont like the fact that I pay the card off in full every month, depriving them of a high interest yield. 
I would be most appreciative if you would straighten this situation out to the extent of ascertaining that my payments are credited and removing any alleged interest and penalties.. I spend an inordinate amount of my time every month going through the same dog and pony show with no results. I an only think that the CEO of CITI would not like to spend a similar amount of his leisure time in such a time consuming and unrewarding pursuit. It would detract from his golf game.