SoapZone Community Message Board

Warning: looooooong. I'll add a tl; dr in bold at the end of this.

I bought my current car back at the end of March in 2023. I didn't exactly choose who I would be getting my loan with; I simply went with the bank offering the lowest interest rate. Within two months, we had our first hiccup. Now I'm a dinosaur...I prefer to pay bills by mail (ridiculous in this day and age, I know). Where I live, the mailboxes are too spread out and the criminals too lazy to make it profitable to steal checks out of them (the mailboxes, not the criminals), and I always drop my bills in the slot inside the post office. My second payment in, I didn't get my bill until five days before it was due. I immediately paid it but was later assessed a late fee, unfairly IMO. The check was dated four days before the bill's due date, as was the postmark on the outside of the envelope. I found out from my bank that my payment was not processed until 16 days past the due date...which was 2 days past the two-week grace period where no late fee would be charged. I tried to argue with the rep on the phone that it wasn't my fault, and I shouldn't be assessed a late fee...he was reading from a script and didn't care, so I had to pay another $20 the next bill.

That led me to set up an online account so I could pay via my laptop. It's...not been great either. First of all, the payment portal only works Monday-Friday, 9:00 AM-5:00 PM. Ridiculous in this day and age, I know...I should be able to make a payment at 3:42 AM on a Saturday night, in my jammies. Second of all, it was only recently that the payment portal allowed you to save information. Ridiculous in this day and age, I know...it doesn't matter though, since I prefer one-time payments. I don't like to give my banking information to a random computer and just trust that they'll take out the exact right amount exactly once a month.

Back on May 12, I went online and filled in all the appropriate info to make a one time car loan payment (it's due on the 15th of every month). At 10:38 AM, I clicked "submit payment". At 10:39 AM, I got an e-mail thanking me for my payment and telling me it could take up to three business days for the payment to go through. I know, I know...

Today, I was at work and I got a call from the bank through which my car loan is (starts with "Associated". Ends with "Bank"). I was unable to answer it at the moment and anyways, I sort of assumed it was a cold call begging me to get their credit card or set up another kind of account with them since I get offers like that from them in the mail all the time. Which...hah! Beelzebub will be needing ice skates before I do business with AB again. But then they left a voice mail. OK, that sounds serious. The store was empty, and I was working with M (84--soon to be 85--year old firecracker, who was literally wearing a t-shirt with firecrackers made out of sequins on it, faux leather pants and a matching leather jacket), so I told M to hold down the fort while I listened to my voicemail. It was AB...and all the message said was "call us". THAT was helpful. So I called and after spending 5 minutes navigating the phone system, I was told I was 13 days late in making my last payment. Um...what? I told the person that couldn't be, that I paid online on the 12th and got a confirmation e-mail. She said the payment "reversed" (something I'd never heard...like, it was rubber and I'm glue and anything you say to it bounces off of it and sticks to me?) and reiterated I owed them my usual payment plus $20. I mentioned I was at work and would have to call them tomorrow, assuming I couldn't talk to them tonight. But I was assured I could call as late as 8:00; when I work the second shift, I'm usually home around 7:30 or so.

On my way home, I stopped at my bank and checked my last 10 transactions and my balance (because I don't bank online...ridiculous in this day and age, I know). Sure enough, the amount of the loan payment was never deducted from my checking account. When I got home, I checked my e-mail (yes, I could've done this on my phone but my eyesight deteriorates a bit more every day, it seems, and I prefer to look at a larger screen) and confirmed I'd received a "good to go, babe!" e-mail from AB. Which...whew. I'm not losing my mind and forgetting to pay my bills.

So I called...went through the phone system again...and got another person. Who, after I explained that I'd paid online and gotten an okey-dokey e-mail said nope, you never paid, pay us xxx + $20. I told her it was true my bank didn't deduct the payment from my account but as she could see on her end, I'd clearly made a "good faith" attempt to pay on time, and was it my fault it didn't go through*?

* maybe it was? Even though you have to type in your routing number and account number in two different spots, it's *possible* I typed it in wrong...but twice? And wrong in the exact same way? If I'd whoopsed a digit in just one spot, it would tell me the numbers don't match.

The woman on the other end of the phone said nope, I still had to pay the late fee and "I don't make the rules". Which is when I might've Karen-ed out a little. Now I never raised my voice. I kept my tone as polite as polite can be, and I told Ms. AB that I'm not faulting her, and she's just lovely. But I also told her I have been disappointed in my overall experience with AB, that I thought it was horrible business practice to charge a late fee when it wasn't (probably wasn't) the account holder's fault and oh yeah, could you please send me a survey because I have LOTS to say.

She just went right back to her script, sounding almost more robotic than AI, asking me if I wanted to make my payment (plus that $20 late fee). All the fight drained out of me. I said sure and gave her my banking info. I only got sassy again when she reminded me I could set up automated payment, that they could just extract my payment right out of my checking account. I just snorted and said oh, I know, but right now I don't have a whole lot of trust in your system.

One last detail to mention...also fairly recently, in addition to confirmation e-mails, I've been getting a letter in the mailbox every month informing me that they received my payment. I've been thinking this was a bit of overkill (though in hindsight, it could be that the e-mail was just to confirm the payment was submitted and the snail mail was to inform me that my bank did indeed debit the payment from my checking account). I got a letter last week and, assuming it was the usual, just tossed it aside. After making my payment tonight, I double-checked it...sure enough, it said the bank "reversed" my payment and I needed to make a payment now before I'm charged a late fee *le sigh*.

Dad has graciously offered to loan me the rest of what I owe on the car and I'm strongly considering taking him up on it. Making a payment to him would be a lot easier than making payments to AB has been over the last couple years.

tl; dr: For some reason, the bank holding my car loan screwed up, or maybe I did, and didn't process my payment a couple weeks ago, so I got a call, called back and got snippy with the poor customer representative, though I assured her several times it wasn't her, it was her company.