Consumer complaint received 2024-11-08 00:00:00
Product: Credit card — Store credit card
Issue: Advertising and marketing, including promotional offers — Confusing or misleading advertising about the credit card
Company: Bread Financial Holdings, Inc.
State: MD

Complaint narrative:
On XX/XX/XXXX, I contacted Helzberg Diamonds Credit Card regarding unnecessary interest charged on my promotional account. As explained by the sales representative the first payment was due XX/XX/XXXX and that would put the 12 month promotion ending on XX/XX/XXXX, however the company is pushing the accrued interest now. 

With this, the sales representative explicitly stated that the 12 months extended from the first payment due date meaning that I should have been extended until XX/XX/XXXX. 

When contacting the customer service representatives, the first sales representative ( # XXXX ) consistently referred to different statements throughout the conversation and would not clarify which ones he was looking at. Then when asked to explain how the accrued interest was calculated resulting in {$1300.00}, he would not provide any explanations. This agent then put me on hold mid-sentence without explanation resulting in an almost 25-minute hold wait which I was then abruptly disconnected from. Calling on a separate phone, I was able to make contact with a different agent almost immediately. This agent plainly apologized for the mis-information between what the sales representatives were telling customers and what the credit card portion of the company was tracking. I then asked this agent ( XXXX ) to explain how the {$1300.00} to which I was then after going in circles and not getting any explanation for 25 minutes I was still not provided an accurate process to how this calculation was made. This agent, while explaining the interest, came up with XXXX completely different dollar amounts than were already shown on the most recent statement. I was then sent to a supervisory agent ( XXXX ) who continued to fail to explain how the interest was calculated. She mentioned the computer just calculates it and was not able to explain why there is a difference in the owed amount on the statement and original amount owed times the APR. When asked to read the terms and conditions of the card to show where it was lined out that accrued interest would be back charged at the end of the promotional cycle the supervisory agent did not have the terms and conditions, they are not on the website or my account and they were not mailed to me. The supervisory agent mentioned they could mail them to me but it would take 10-15 business days for them to arrive, which I did still ask to be completed. This cycle occurred for almost two hours total and there was no resolution or explanation of why the sales rep gave the wrong information or how the interest rate was calculated. 

Overall, the promotional program was directly made misleading to take advantage of consumers by having sale representatives tell customers information that does not match up to credit company information, not providing terms and conditions to the customer, and then charging accrued interest before the customer has been told the promotion would end.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation