Karen sent a message to Greg D. Carmichael – Chief Executive Officer of Fifth Third Bancorp – Email Address that said:
Dear Mr. Carmichael, I have been a loyal customer for over 20 years. I primarily do my banking through my checking account, carry a decent amount of money in savings (approx. $40,000) and have a charge card as back-up for overdrafts only.
The reason for my writing has to do with my Fifth Third charge card. I paid a bill using my checking account and my deposit was off by a few days resulting in an overdraft. When I learned that it happened, I went to my local bank but unfortunately the manager was tied up, so back In April I called the 800# and paid the amount owed in full. Unfortunately, an interest fee of $17 surfaced afterwards. I was not aware as I did not look at the statement since I knew I had paid it in full. Unbeknownst to me it accrued interest and owed approximately $65. I started to receive calls from collections and called on a few occasions to better understand how this happened as I paid the amount due in full. I learned that I owed $17 in interest, but then escalated to $65. I spoke with a nice guy Josh recently. He told me he would look into it and call me back. I received quite a few calls from collections thereafter and I told them that someone was looking into it. They could not see any records and I continued to receive quite a number of calls. It seemed as if no one knew what the other person was doing. So last week I called collections (waited about 10 minutes)...was transferred to disputes and waited for 15 minutes for them to answer only to find out I was not in disputes, but had to call customer service. Called customer service, but they were closed this past Friday. This morning collections called my home at 8am. Frustrated I called customer service again and was transferred to a supervisor Jeff only to find out that Josh did look into it and said that they listened to the tape and I owed the entire amount. Josh left me a message but I had been travelling. Frustrated I asked Jeff to speak with his boss and he said he was as far as I could go. I told him that this situation frustrated me greatly, I was willing to pay the $17, but that I seriously thought about moving to another bank. That did not make a difference or seem to faze him. I paid the $65 to stop the calls, but still extremely frustrated out of principle!
So why am I writing to you? You have a lot more important things on your plate then to hear about some frustrated customer with a transaction issue. I write to you because I actually love my local branch. They are terrific and have been good to me over the years. For their sake and mine, I do not want to change banks BUT I felt that it was important that you be aware of this situation. The relentless badgering from collections who struggle speaking English and call at off hours (I have an 89 year old mother that is constantly being disturbed), one hand not being able to know what the other hand was doing, the lack of flexibility…all of this stirring a customer’s emotions to a point of leaving Fifth third.
I do not typically take the time to vent my frustrations, but think it is important in this case as Fifth Third’s mantra is that you have a “A history of providing superior customer service and following sound banking principles”.
Most sincerely,
Karen
