How Stupid is Capitol One? THIS STUPID...

[mom-from-missouri]

So, you have all heard the story of how the husband got laid off last year....We are not credit card people, but his old job required him to have a credit card, for out of town travel. He had to put travel and meals on it, and turn it in to be reimbursed. Right before he left, He submitted his last trip. and we received back the reimbursement check. Since we had no income coming in for him at that time (only my rental and daycare income, and my retirement, and the kinds social security) we were sort of in that panic mode. So, instead of doing the usual pay of the card in full, we opted to make monthly payments on the card and use the check for living expenses. It was a rather large check. Husband then started working a small paying job where he got paid weekly, so I had the monthly capitol one payment coming out weekly from his checking account instead of one monthly payment. It was never late.

Card is now paid off, in full. And, yesterday I noticed that even though it was paid off in full in January, capitol one is still taking out of his checking account weekly payments. So, he calls them to stop taking it out and to request the money back. They said he has to request it back in writing, and it can take 6 weeks to receive the check and up to 4 weeks to stop taking the cash out. So, instead, we went to the grocery store and used the credit and cancelled the card. Never again will we use capitol one. We also called our local bank and stopped it effective now.

It took 6 calls just to get some one who spoke English at capitol one. How many others have they done this to that have not noticed??

[disneysteve]

yesterday I noticed that even though it was paid off in full in January, capitol one is still taking out of his checking account weekly payments.

How did you notify them to stop making the weekly payments? If you just did it by phone, you don't have any written proof of your request. Hopefully, you did it in writing so that you have documentation that you told them to stop as of a certain date which they then failed to do. I'd certainly be writing to the company demanding the immediate return of the money that was taken out after you told them to stop the payments. If you have a confirmation of your request, even better. Send along a copy of that.

[snafu]

Yikes, this is one these situations where you really need to understand the small details in automatic payments. Sorry, taking action to stop automatic payments becomes your responsibility as the credit grantor doesn't know if items are still outstanding, not yet posted from vendor to account. Using the credit at the grocery store solves that problem.

So many of the customer service jobs are off shore. Staff have a script to follow. Anything unusual or off script is a problem as they have zero authority.

[disneysteve]

taking action to stop automatic payments becomes your responsibility

Absolutely. If you set up an automatic payment, only you can stop the automatic payment, as it should be. You wouldn't want Capital One to be able to stop the auto payment without you requesting it. But once you do request they stop, they should stop right away, not keep charging you.

[mom-from-missouri]

Absolutely. If you set up an automatic payment, only you can stop the automatic payment, as it should be. You wouldn't want Capital One to be able to stop the auto payment without you requesting it. But once you do request they stop, they should stop right away, not keep charging you.

When we set up the automatic payment, it states "payment will cease once the account is paid in full". Account was paid in full. The payments should have stopped on their own, they didn't. The bank read the paperwork and agreed with us and said they have this problem with citibank and citi mortgage often. Very often. They are the ones who said they could stop the payments as fraud and suggested we cancel the card and go buy groceries with the credit. So, we went to the store and did just that then came home and husband cancelled the card.

[disneysteve]

When we set up the automatic payment, it states "payment will cease once the account is paid in full". Account was paid in full. The payments should have stopped on their own, they didn't.

That's interesting. In that case, I certainly agree with you. If their own policy was to only take out payments until the account was paid off, that's exactly what should have happened. I was thinking this was an auto payment that you set up yourself and that you would have to cancel when you no longer wanted it.

[rennigade]

It took 6 calls just to get some one who spoke English at capitol one.

Maybe you were pressing 2 for Spanish?

Also...the person you spoke with who had poor English probably spoke English better than you could speak their language. Gotta love small town mentality.

[disneysteve]

the person you spoke with who had poor English probably spoke English better than you could speak their language.

That's probably true, but if you can't understand them on the phone, what good is it?

I've had numerous experiences of calling a customer service line and having to hang up and call back because I simply couldn't communicate with the person on the other end of the line. Yes they were speaking English but it clearly wasn't their primary language, they didn't speak it well, and they had an accent that made them virtually unintelligible.

I've actually read that it can be better to push to get a Spanish-speaking agent. Typically, those calls are fielded by bi-lingual agents in the US as opposed to the English line that is going overseas to Mumbai or elsewhere.

[LizfromtheBronx]

I'm sorry to hear that you had such trouble, and maybe there is a difference between the Cap One CC folks and their Auto Finance folks...but I've spoken to them several times in the last few weeks, since I was refinancing my car (from Cap One to a new lender). I called to discuss with them how much notice they would need before I cancelled my Auto-Pay (didn't want to cancel it until I had notification of payoff check being received). I also spoke to them a few times regarding posting of the payoff check and overpayment due back to me. Each time, I spoke with a native US English speaker, they were very friendly and helpful. I did handle cancelling the Auto Pay on my own via their website, so I had a confirmation #, email, all that jazz.

[ua_guy]

If this truly was Cap One's responsibility to cancel the automatic payments when the account balance reached zero, that's very poor service--and so is providing help from people that don't have full command of English language. If I "Press 1" for English, I expect to get someone that has full command of my language--it's simply part of effective communication so complex issues can be resolved.

I'd recommend if you need a card in the future to go with a bank that still has customer service ops based in the US. American Express still has their service center here, as do many Credit Unions who either do their own services, or outsource their card services to other agencies in the US, or other small municipal or state banks. Most of the national bank's card services have all gone offshore.

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

Maybe you were pressing 2 for Spanish?

Also...the person you spoke with who had poor English probably spoke English better than you could speak their language. Gotta love small town mentality.

That comment misses the point. It is not a matter of being open-minded.

Speaking English poorly to even fairly well is not good enough if one is conducting business over the phone where sound quality may be compromised, there is no shared screen or paper to point to, and facial expressions plus gestures cannot help fill the gap. Obviously Capital One knew they needed to hire English speakers to work with customers who are likely to themselves speak English primarily. Capital One hired people they thought were adequate for that. So bringing up that the customer service person speaks better English than the customer speaks some other language is not pertinent. It has nothing to do with a small town mentality. There ARE native English speakers who have difficulty understanding each other's accents. Not only does the Cap One representative need to be understood by the customer, but the rep needs to understand the customer. That takes a good or experienced communicator.