Misadventures In Balance Transfer Land.
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I began yesterday morning with the intention of applying for this balance transfer card. I liked that it was 0% interest for 12 months, and I really liked that there was no balance transfer fee. We’ve been kicking around the idea of doing a balance transfer for almost a year. I was worried about what it would do to my FICO score (applying for new credit, and then maxing out the available credit is never good!). However, I checked my credit score and it was 783, and so we decided that even if it went down a few points it would be worth it because of the money we are going to save in interest. Plus, with the economy the way it is, it looks like it may be almost a year before we buy a house, so I’ll have time to get this card paid off by then.
Things got off to an inauspicious start when the phone number on the web page for the card didn’t work. It just made a funny busy signal noise. I didn’t want to apply on line because I had questions (namely, I wanted to verify the 0 fee and 0% and also make sure I would be able to get the balance transfer in the form of balance transfer checks). So, I googled and found a number for Citibank Upromise and I called them to see if they could help me. To make a (very) long story short, after 5 different phone calls, countless hold time, and countless dropped connections, I decided I was going to apply online after all.
They had a nice button on the webpage that said that existing citicard members could take a shortcut in applying. I wanted to do this party because I like shortcuts, and partly because I felt like I would get a higher credit line if they saw that I was an existing citibank customer. My personal income right now is relatively low, but I have a credit line of $7000 on my existing citibank card and I wanted to come in right around $7000 here too, so I figured I would have a better chance of getting that much here if they saw they’d already given me that much before and I’d been responsible with it.
Unfortunately, that didn’t work. It kept giving me an error, even though I was inputting all the information correctly. After 3 attempts (and a phone call to Citibank again!) it locked me out and I wasn’t able to apply that way. At this point, I was very frustrated. You would think Citibank, whose stock has basically plummeted lately, would want to do everything in their power to attract a good new customer and give them a line of credit. Apparently, thats not their business model. Endless frustration and transferring irritated potential-customers to people with an ever-slimmer grasp of the English language is more their style.
I ultimately ended up having to apply as a new customer. Unfortunately, they only gave me a $4100 line of credit. This is not high enough to accomplish what we need to accomplish- namely, consolidating all of my fiance’s credit card debt. I tried to sign online to request a credit line increase (an option available to me on my existing citibank card) but my online profile apparently wasn’t activated yet even though I set it up when I signed up for the card. I then tried to call, but again they can’t do anything until I receive my card in approximately 2-3 weeks when they may be able to increase the credit limit.
Altogether, it was a very frustrating almost 3 hours of my life gone, and I still haven’t accomplished what I needed to do. This, my friends, is a prime example of why you should never get into debt- especially credit card debt. We are all at the mercy of these Credit Card Monsters, and we won’t be free until we can say goodbye forever!
