Paying a credit card on the due date? Don't wait until the afternoon.
Filed under: Banks
One day, I predict, a bank will go too far with their fees, and there will be some measurable backlash, where there will start becoming a trend of people more commonly putting their money in credit unions or under their mattress. We're not there yet, but apparently Bank of America is trying to speed up that day.The Atlanta Journal Constitution has an interesting story about one Greg Fischer, a consumer who paid his September Bank of America credit card payment through his bank's web site. He paid on the deadline day.
However, his bank said that he was late anyway. Why? He paid at 4:10 in the afternoon, past a 3:30 p.m. cut-off that he wasn't aware of, a cut-off, I'm sure, that's buried somewhere in legalese on his credit card statement or on the credit card's web site.
He's out more than just a late fee. Since he was late with a payment in April, his interest rate doubled to 28.99 percent. He was told that the bank wouldn't consider lowering the fee until he had paid on time for six months. Now if you do the math, April to September is six months straight. Nice timing.
So I have a suggestion to credit cards and credit card users. If you're a credit card user, and you often do pay your bill around the deadline day, you may want to dial up customer service and see if there's a certain hour and minute you need to make your payment by. If you're a credit card company, you'd probably engender a lot of goodwill if you'd simply jot down a time on the bill, whether it's 3:30 p.m. or 10:14 a.m., right next to the words that say "Due Date."
Geoff Williams is a freelance journalist and the author of C.C. Pyle's Amazing Foot Race: The True Story of the 1928 Coast-to-Coast Run Across America (Rodale).
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 18)
12-02-2008 @ 11:21AM
Allison said...
Yeah Bank Of America is famous for that even when yo go into the branch itself. Please do not go ln on a friday after 2:00pm because your payment will definitely be late,even though the bank is open until six all transaction after 2:00pm will not be accounted for until the next business day which would be a monday granted it's not a holiday then you are looking at tuesday. True story this happened to me december of 2007 with them.
Reply
12-04-2008 @ 11:03AM
BETH said...
BANK OF AMERICA IS THE SCUMMIEST BANK IN AMERICA!!!!!!!!!
12-02-2008 @ 3:57PM
susie said...
this also happened to me , but believe it or not they gave me a courtesy adjustment (1 time only) and took the late fee off as well as the rate, so possibly if you had asked them they would have done the same. Thank goodness I learned this lesson with no foul to me. because I feel that is stealing on their part I now owe them 0 and never will.BOA seems to want to abuse the system and not care about the customer so they don't need my business
12-02-2008 @ 4:04PM
larry said...
It's just an excuse to increase the percentage rate.
what ever happened to the extortion laws, guess they don't apply to banks and oil producers.
12-02-2008 @ 4:42PM
Te' said...
Well, I work for Bank of America and I can tell you firsthand that the only people who can most accurately avoid falling into a bank's traps are employees of banks and other financial institutions and providers. As much as we'd all like to think that we're doing huge banks a service by putting our money in them truth is, if you didnt put it into major, strong institutions like Bank of America, where else would you REALLY trust that your money would be safe while still providing the widest range of customer service and other convienience features? Companies like B of A know this so they can pretty much charge you whatever types of fees they want and either you sulk and bear it, or be upset,close your accounts,and go to another institution who you probably don't trust nearly as much with your money.
Bottom line, ask questions, read the fine print, make sure you know exactly what it is that you're getting yourself involved in before you do it. As long as you know how to play the game,you won't have these problems. It sucks, but what can you do?
(As for the credit card cut-off time causing payments to be late,it's actually no longer true. As of September 9, 2008, you can come INTO THE BANKING CENTER at ANY time on ANY day of the week and have credit for that payment on that day.... EVEN WEEKENDS and it will NOT be late. I repeat it will NOT be late. You will not get charged a late fee and there will be no rate increase as long as it is paid AT THE BANKING CENTER by CLOSE OF BANKING CENTER on the CALENDAR day due!. However, if paid after the next business daycut-off time-either 2pm or 3pm depending on which region of the country you live in, your receipt will read for the next business day, only because there are several different types of teller transactions performed which must be processed for the next business day after the cut-off time for proofing purposes.Currently BOA is working on a way to fix this discrepancy)
12-02-2008 @ 5:39PM
Lyndsey45 said...
Any bank, such as Bank of America, will never get my business as long as they hand out mortgages & loans to non-citizens (also known as "illegals"). There are thousands of hard working citizens that are turned down for loans & I say give these folks a chance first.
12-02-2008 @ 5:50PM
FB said...
You've got to read the fine print.
WORRIED ABOUT TRAILER THEFT?? You need to:
http://www.carrythebigstick.com
12-02-2008 @ 10:22PM
Roxanne said...
It is not only BOA - all credit card companies, or whomever you are paying on-line, CLEARLY have posted the cut-off times. This would be no different if you mailed your check to them and it was received the next business day. All businesses have cut-off times! Where have you folks been?
12-02-2008 @ 7:34PM
jrfiero said...
Gimme a break. Most, if not all, banks and other services have a similar policy. It's very clear online at BoA and most other places. If you need to wait till the last day to pay, it's your responsibility to know the rules.
12-02-2008 @ 8:14PM
Madeline Hatim said...
I also encountered the same practice with Capital One Bank and I was so pissed I e-mailed the company after I paid the bill on line. This kind of greed is one of the reasons banks are in the mess they are in now. Also banks have, it seems are starting to raise fees and interest rates in the middle of a contract and you are not given the option of declining the contract. Consumers are going to have to become less dependent on credit and live more within our means. You can't have a credit rating if you don't have debt and you can't have a decent credit rating if you happen on difficult times for a while and can't pay on time, or the minimum payment or any other difficulty that comes with living daily in America.
12-02-2008 @ 8:08PM
patdunn said...
Good point.
While you type your CC discrepancies onto this board why don't we all copy and paste to an email to our State reps and Senators?
Yeah, that won't happen.
12-03-2008 @ 9:02AM
Tom said...
Here are some good related stories...
What if you don’t pay your credit card bills?
http://www.curiousread.com/2008/09/what-if-you-dont-pay-your-credit-card.html
10 Things You Might Not Know About Your Credit Card
http://www.curiousread.com/2008/07/10-things-you-might-not-know-about-your.html
12-03-2008 @ 9:04AM
Jon Boy said...
Good read....
What if you don’t pay your credit card bills?
http://www.curiousread.com/2008/09/what-if-you-dont-pay-your-credit-card.html
12-03-2008 @ 1:02PM
Dina said...
The Bank of America where I live sometimes puts up a sign at the drive thru that 1PM is the cut off, but not all of the time. In addition to the fact that most of their employees don't speak English that well. One time I went in and was greeted in Spanish. I guess since I'm 100% Italian that makes me look Hispanic. They do whatever they want, when and however they want.
12-03-2008 @ 1:27PM
mike said...
if you actually read the back of your statement, it says what the cut off times for payments are. if you dont read the back of your statement youre an idiot. you wouldnt get a mortgage or a car loan without reading the contract terms, why dont you do it on your credit cards? people are too lazy and self absorbed. to those who say banks give loans to illegals, youre idiots as well. banks CANNOT give a loan to anyone without a social security number or federal tax id number. the federal government would fine and restrict trade on any institution that broke these laws.
12-03-2008 @ 1:34PM
brian said...
It just happened to me this month with capitol one I was one day late I payed online thru my bank and it was the first time I had ever done that so I wasn't privy to the fact it would take an extra day to post. I would have done it a day earlier. I called capitol one and they said the time between getting the bill and the due date is agrace paeriod andafter that date itis past due.theyfelt I had been given enough time. charged me 39.00. And changed my rate to 29.00% Two years before this not late once
12-28-2008 @ 1:04AM
Fina said...
The gentleman who posted about giving mortgage loans without a SSN is correct. I distinctly recall reading approx. 2 yrs ago about people getting these loans in the western U.S. What I specifically recall saying was my loan was 82 pages long, wanted to know my life history & sign over my 1st born and these (people) can get a loan with NO proof of income NOR SSN!! After the mortgage meltdown and bank bail-out, I discovered that B of A was the BIGGEST culprit! So, yes, it's true. You may look it up.
2-16-2009 @ 5:48PM
George said...
Even better for Bank of A. My due date was Sunday; paid at 5:15 on a Friday. It was posted Monday and i was late.
2-17-2009 @ 12:23PM
michele said...
Allison: The exact same thing happened to me with Bank of America. I paid my credit card payment on a Saturday before 2 PM and my payment was not credited until Monday. I called Bank of America and raised a stink about the late fee they charged me and of course their comment was" If you are unhappy with us, goes some where else". Have been with them when they were called Landmark Bank in the 70's, nice company would'nt you say?
12-02-2008 @ 12:24PM
Whiplash said...
Why on earth do companies go out of their way to treat their customers badly? It would be so easy to simply change the system to calculate late fees starting from a later hour in the day. How about midnight? With electronic transactions becoming the norm, the due date should mean the entire day! But no, they set the time early in the day for no other reason than to milk more money from their customers.
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