O/T BF had yet another terrible AMEX encounter

After 21 years of being a faithful, paying cardholder, service has just gotten worse and worse. Tonight after 45 - 50 min on the phone, with nothing getting resolved, he got transferred to a supervisor who said to him, "I find it hard to believe that happened . . . blah blah blah, our Global Service, blah blah." Calling him a liar basically, and then trumpeting her agenda and not even listening to his concern or problem!! Oh, and *telling* him he was not on the phone for half an hour. (for the record the total call time was 55 min 43 sec) Unbelieveable. These are the same folks who told us we could only redeem our points for a rental car online, earlier this year when we took a trip. Well, we were stuck 4 hours on the tarmac and missed our scheduled bus on arrival. Last bus of the night. Some of us don't live with a computer at our hip - especially when traveling. Isn't that the idea of a card that you use to travel with?!? For such unforeseen emergencies? It's just been one bad fiasco after another all year long and this was the proverbial icing on the cake. Anyone have a great card they use and love their service lol?

14 years ago

Girl X

(website)

Veteran

That sucks! Our main card is a Mastercard via Citi bank, with American Airlines points. The only annoyance we ever have with the card is that their fraud detection system is exceptionally paranoid, which means that the card gets locked more often than we'd like and we have to call and let them know that we did indeed buy whatever it is that they found suspicious. The up side is that whenever a charge shows up on our card that we didn't put there - they take care of it with minimal fuss.

rae

Euh, I've been using my Amazon Visa... I must admit that the main draw was being able to use the points directly through Amazon instead of logging into another site and waiting for a gift card to come in the mail. I do use Amazon a lot, though. I actually just called in tonight to ask about a strange balance, and a very nice person was able to quickly explain that my returns hadn't quite been applied to the total balance yet, even though they showed up on the activity. Done and done. No scripted service leading me in circles, no attitude.

I also have really liked banking and using cards from our small credit union over the years. Personal service, local staff, and many times better rates and rewards.

Kari

Holy cow, Mo, that is really rotten customer service. I'm very sorry!

My credit card is a VISA through BECU, and they are great. I've always received extremely pleasant customer service over many years of use, even when I had some really stupid questions (such as: "I've managed to lock myself out of my online account and I can't even remember the username I set myself up with!")

Like GirlX mentioned with her service, BECU is pretty zealous with their fraud detection - to date I've not had an actual fraudulent charge on my card (knock on wood!) but a few things have triggered the fraud detection flag (such as purchasing a few scattered mp3s online, then making a big purchase the next day - apparently this is a common fraud technique for people who are forging a card and want to test it to make sure transactions go through before blowing through a wad of someone else's credit.) Every time, though, they immediately call me up just to double-check that the transactions were actually from me, which I very much appreciate.

ironkurtin

I've had terrible experiences with AmEx as well. I had a card through Time-Warner for travel when I was an employee, which the company forgot to cancel when I left (thanks guys). Someone got the number and had some fun with it. AmEx insisted I was on the hook for the charges because the account was in my name and "I never reported it missing." Since when does a card have to MISSING for the number to be stolen?! That was a long painful fight which wound up costing me $500, although it could have been worse.

I've had good experiences with Mastercard and Visa. I actually appreciate the fraud detection, although it is a hassle to change numbers every time. Ever since the new legislation went through here in the US I've noticed a definite uptick in customer service - it dipped for a while but now is back.

Thanks ladies. We also get the 'fraud flag' when we drive across the country and gas up state to state. He calls ahead to tell them we are driving, and to please not shut off the card, but invariably it happens anyway, and then - you guessed it - it's back on teh phone for 30 min to get things straightened out to use the card again. Once this happened where our phone barely got reception in Texas somewhere and was particularly exasperating.
I think a big part of the problem is the outsourced jobs and the communication breakdowns that happen between cultures. Just knowing a language isn't necessarily enough to *understand* what the customer wants or needs from you. Anyway, this still didnt' get resolved. They offered to have another supervisor call him back. Yeah, we'll see if that happens. Anyway, thanks for letting me vent. As the BF says, they are lucky he's the kind of guy who pays their bills, otherwise he'd charge up a nice suit and watch and tell them to take their card and shove it! He'll probably just tell them to take their card, minus charging it to the hilt first

celia

That must be frustrating. I am sorry that you both had to go trought so much trouble and complications in something that should be easy and meant to make life simpler.

Wow, the gas story shows VERY poor conduct for a company with the "Don't leave home without it" slogan! You are definitely right that knowing the language is not enough to help a customer... I had this problem with my last health insurance company. You could tell they were working off of some kind of question-answer flow chart or something, and they just didn't know what to do with a question that deviated from that. They just kept repeating the same things, word-for-word. I think the worst part is when they don't realize that they can't help you and would need to go to a higher authority.

Makrame

Like Rae, I use Amazon visa for most purchases. It is from Chase, and you can either redeem points on Amazon directly or ask for a cash check when you accumulate certain number of points. Basically, you get 1 cent on every $ you spend. I have not had any issues with Chase customer service.

I also just got a JP Morgan card from Chase to use for travel. No foreign transaction fees, and if your flight is delayed by more than 6 hours, the card is supposed to cover some expenses (like a hotel).

I am so used to getting great customer service with credit card companies that I would probably cancel the AmEx immediately if I had encountered these types of issues.

Kappy

We love our Chase Sapphire. We've never had to pay an annual fee; not sure why?? We do pay the balance off each month so rate doesn't matter (current rate is 7%). I strictly redeem our points for cash each month (they just apply it to your bill). I don't want any points, credits or gift cards for my purchases ... just give me cold hard cash please!

ETA: Oh, just noticed there's a Chase Sapphire (no annual fee) and a Chase Sapphire Preferred ($95 annual fee). That's why we don't pay an annual fee (which I don't believe in)

7%?! I never run a balance but 7% is amazing! I'm definitely checking that out!

elpgal

I am surprised no one has mentioned it, but I love our Discover card. I have been using it for the past decade or so with no problems at all.

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