Back in the day, many moons ago, I held their credit cards. I cancelled these cards. It was nothing against their services. I just felt I had too many credit cards and I wasn’t using their’s. It was nothing personal.
Flash forward several years. I get ‘offers’ in the mail. Offers to get a credit card from them again. Some of the offers seem …OK…but I am just not interested.
But the offers keep coming. And coming faster and faster.
I get three offers from Chase EVERY GODDAMNED WEEK. I wish I was exaggerating, but I’m not. At least 3 times a week, I get an application that already has my name and address on it. Each envelope has at least 3 pieces of paper in it.
Is this good business sense? Does this strategy pay? How paper is wasted to do this? I cannot imagine I am the only one. I am one little person in a very big city. There must be tens of thousands of people like me in L.A. alone. Are all of these people being bombarded with envelopes like I am? Am I last guy with decent credit? And even if I filled out the application and got the card, can my business pay for what you have already wasted in paper, ink, envelopes, printing, man hours and delivery costs???
I would think that a computer program would figure out that papering me like this has not been cost effective. I would think they may better suited to hit me, say once a month.
And it’s not just Chase. Citibank and USBank are doing it too.
Bank of America and Discover keep sending me offers to spend more money and I already have their cards. Seriously, B of A and Disover send me checks in mail every month.
I cannot conceive of the amount of paper that has been shoved into my mailbox alone over the last couple of years. There is a bald patch in a rainforest that is growing in a fruitless attempt to get me to spend more money.
You can also call BoA and Discover and ask them to stop sending you those checks every month. it may take a month or two for it to take effect, but they’re willing to do it. (Well, Discover is; I don’t have a BoA credit card.)
Second the suggestion just to call the banks. I did so after I kept getting solicitations for the Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards card from Chase (like twice a week). I was considering just cancelling my membership in the Southwest Airlines frequent flyer program but I called the bank instead. Just use the same toll-free number that’s already in those mailings and politely ask them to stop sending mail.
I wonder if there’s a way to opt out of all the damned insurance offers I keep getting. Seriously, Geico has sent me enough paper to reprint a Harry Potter book.
I had opted out of credit card offers a while ago, but I don’t remember having to mail in anything (which you have to do for permanent opt-out at the link provided). And I don’t remember being able to opt out of insurance offers, so it might have been through some other site.
It would be nice to stop getting offers for auto insurance, since I don’t drive. Talk about wasted effort on the part of the insurance companies!
Guess I need to opt out. Even after accepting one of the Citi Card solicitations and opening an account, I still get solicitations from them at least once a week.
Instead of opting out, you could always use the posted paid envelope, and stick everything back in the envelope that doesn’t have your name or address on it. There is a surprising amount of stuff that you can send right back to the credit card, insurance, or whatever company is bombarding your mailbox.
just a thought. Not that I’ve ever done it of course. But it would help out the post office AND if done in a large enough volume, could help save some trees… and ink.
I had issues with Bell Canada sending me ads for digital TV. I was getting three envelopes a week. I am on their “Do Not Mail” list as well as their “Do Not Text” and “Do Not Call” lists. They were recently fined $1.3 million because they contracted out to a provider who ignored the “Do Not Call” list. I got the postal mail for their digital TV service to stop when I collected two months worth and sent it to their VP of marketing along with a note saying that as a result of their mail campaign I was never, EVER going to subscribe for their TV service, and for every piece of junk mail I received after a particular date, I would be unsubscribing from one of their services to which I did subscribe. That put a very sudden end to the deluge of mail.