But I do have a random, unathorized charge of $796.90 from The American Cancer Society, East Lansing on this month’s credit card statement. This pisses me off to no end and I sure as hell hope that it was a clerical error and that the Cancer society hasn’t started collecting credit card numbers from trash cans! It seems that someone manually entered a charge incorrectly since my college tuition payment for my summer classes is right below it in the identical amount of $796.60.
The credit card company better not hassle me about removing it.
Goddamn fuckers. (excuse me, but I am steaming!)
I’m glad I have a decent credit limit or I could have been so screwed.
Any advice on how to go about getting this removed? How likely will the credit card company acknowledge the error? Has anyone gone through the same thing and has a horror story that may shed light on what to say/not to say?
I plan on calling the card company first thing in the morning. Bah.
Give me hope!
I see no reason why this won’t get corrected, but it will probably take longer than you would like.
They cannot charge you interest on a disputed item and you do not have to pay it while it is under investigation.
Something not too dissimilar happened to me once awhile back and I wanted it cleared up yesterday and blew a head gasket when that did not happen. Probably a waste of phosphate.
Just be honest, tell them what happened and point out the obvious mistake, although in your post the cents differ. (understandable) You mentioned that you are not near your credit limit, so you should be just fine. Telling them anything on the phone, however, will not preserve your rights; you must follow up with a letter. Perhaps nowadays they accept email in lieu of snail mail, but I rather doubt it.
Call them and ask them to reverse it. I’d say it’s 80% likely that’ll work. In a little while you will have your money back.
If they won’t do it, SEND THEM A REGISTERED LETTER asking it be done. If you want to go to your credit card company they will need evidence you tried to solve it with the ACS with no success. A registered letter does that.
Once it gets to that stage and you’ve provided your credit card company with the evidence, they will solve it, and it won’t take them long, believe me.
We had this problem with our cable provider. Charges started showing up on Mrs. RickJay’s credit card for someone else’s bill. For months, the cable provider denied knowledge of the problem and wouldn’t respond to any for of communication; we got a huge runaround.
But when we properly informed VISA, the problem was solved in 48 hours and the money was returned… with interest. The credit card companies are very serious about pursuing such matters. Yes, indeedy. A big organization might blow off Joe Schmoe who claims to have an unauthorized charge, but when VISA/Mastercard/Discover/Amex’s Frauds and Investigations Division comes calling, it’s amazing how fast problems can be rectified.
I will second that. I’ve had a handfull of purchases go awry, from incorrect charges to never receiving orders. After several fruitless attempts to clear the matter with the offending company, a quick call to the credit card company cleared everything.
Here’s my guess on what will happen: you call the CC company and tell them you are disputing a charge, they mark it as such and send you an official form to fill out and return. You do this and they handle the rest.
I wouldn’t worry about going to ACS, I would go straight to the credit card company. There should be an address on the back of your statement for sending your dispute of a charge (an official form is not necessarily needed). It definitely needs to be done by mail.
American Express for one will credit the disputed charge amount while it is being investigated, which is nice for not keeping it one your balance. But as mentioned, you won’t need to pay the disputed amount or interest on it as long as you notify the credit card, in writing, of the dispute.