Not a good idea, actually, Bryan. In our more innocent days we tried
that just once during a period of high financial pressure on our
modest resources, transferring a sizeable balance from our regular
carrier to a new low-APR-offering company. And that is how we learned
about predatory creditors.
The first thing we found is that the amount showed up immediately as
owing under the new card company, but that they did not actually send
payment at once to the old company. (Why would they? Every day it's
in their account means interest for them.) It took a while to clear
from the old, so both of them charged US for interest for the total
same amount for the same month. Never mind that it's illogical--that
is how it appeared in their systems. So until the old company was
paid off by the new one, they both held us responsible for the
balance. The old company, of course, started charging us overdue fees
as soon as we missed a payment.
The second thing is that one would typically wait for 45 minutes
listening to music on hold before reaching a real person to try to
straighten it out. If you got strung out and gave up, you would have
to call back and start the wait all over.
The third is that promises made over the phone by none-too-courteous
operators, once you finally reached them, might not actually be
fulfilled in the next cycle or the one after or the one after that,
and you could garner several months' worth of surplus charges (and
receive a lot of very unnerving dunning phone calls) while you waited
for things to get put right. Every wrong bill meant another
phone-waiting endurance test, the poor service level obviously being
calculated to discourage phone calls and delay crediting inproper
charges.
And the fourth, as scribe points out, is that they whack you hard for
late receipt of payments--which seemed to occur one month in two
regardless of how early we mailed our checks. There was also a month
or two when somehow we never received a bill for some mysterious
reason, and by the time we realized it, we really were late. Notice
that the declaration of "late" is made at their end with no appeal,
and you have no way of proving when you actually mailed it unless you
use a special postal service.
Needless to say, it did not take us long at all, like maybe about 15
minutes after the first double billing appeared, to realize that we'd
made a BIG mistake. What it took to undo it was a huge struggle,
untold hours on hold on the phone, paperwork, tenacity, endurance, and
desperate persistence, while our bills got worse and worse at just the
time when we could least afford them. We ended up taking out a LOAN
to pay them off and get them out of our lives!
These days we use only one card, clear our balance every month, and
stick to cash whenever possible. Everything that comes into our house
with a return address of Wilmington, DE, goes straight into the
garbage, usually chased by an unprintable word or two. I would never
take a chance on letting an outfit like that get one up on us again.
In sum, floridaguy, it's bait pure and simple, bait with an especially
nasty hook behind it. If you think you can beat them at their own
game, go ahead and try, but if you are running close to the edge
financially, it's a very dangerous gamble.
Apteryx |
