Jim and I met at the credit union on Friday, September 28th, to sign paper work and whatnot. Thankfully the member service representative confirmed with the loan specialist if anything was missing. Jim officially became a member, and my desire to get an increase on our credit card went through. We were told the card would come in about a week.
This new credit card would replace the old credit card. Said card was in my name and only had Jim as a signer. New card would have a higher limit (only by $500) and thus become a jointly owned card. I was also informed that when the cards came I was to call the number on them and immediately the old card would be deactivated and the new card would have all previous transactions on it. Seemed easy, right?
The cards came on Tuesday of this week, which was convenient because I needed to make a payment. I opened the envelope, pulled out the paperwork, and called the number on the little sticker attached to the cards. I then went online to make a payment to the account. The old account was still there, but I thought maybe I had to add the new card number. So I did. And sure enough I saw the new limit, but there were no charges or transactions. I then looked back at the other card number, and nothing had changed. So essentially I had two lines of credit.
I phoned the credit union and had to tell my entire story to members service representative number 5. As you remember it took 3 calls to get the woman who told us we needed to sign paperwork. Number 4 was the woman at the credit union. So this means I was on number 5. Number 5 called the credit card department and finally came back to tell me that I had not activated the card. I insisted I had, but hung up and called the activation number again. As I suspected, the automated number informed me that the card had already been activated. I know, right?
So I called the credit union again, and got the same representative. I was relieved that I didn't need to tell my story AGAIN. However, I was put on hold, for the nth time. When the representative returned I was informed the credit department activated the card for me (I guess something was amiss), but it would take 24 hours to have the account information switch. I started hysterically laughing. Why? Because honestly, at this point I had the money in our checking account to cover the overage which was the whole reason I asked for the increase in the first place. I was initially worried that we would be charged a fee for the overage, but we were not. I was simply trying to be proactive, and yet what a mess!
So yesterday after work (which was more than 24 hours later), I checked the website. Nothing had changed. Once again I called the credit union to speak to a representative. Unfortunately the one I had worked with the day before was busy, so I had to explain my entire story to another representative: number 6. Number 6 put me on hold, came back and asked for the numbers again, put me on hold, came back to ask for the spelling of my name on the original card, and put me on hold again for a long time. When she returned I was told the original account was closed and that it would be another 24 hours before the other account showed the transfer of the balance.
Again I began laughing, after all it wasn't this person's fault. I couldn't be angry, but another 24 hours? Seriously!? I think number 6 thought I was insane, for real. And I did tell her that if in 24 hours things had not changed I would be canceling the account all together. I do not have time like this to handle stupidity.
This morning the original account shows "canceled" on the website. The new account shows a transfer of the balance. And the cool part? I don't owe a minimum payment! Of course I still paid it, because after all this wasn't about avoiding payment but avoiding an additional payment.
On the plus side: Jim is now a full-fledged member of the credit union, AND the credit card associated with said institution
What a crazy day. What a crazy school year thus far. But at least it gives entertaining blog posts.
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