Chase Credit Card Payment Scare

What would you do if the amount you owed on your mortgage suddenly showed up on your credit card bill?

Chase Bank

Here’s a little background.  I’ve had a Chase credit card for years and have been paying the bill with our online bill pay service for most of that time.  A while back, Chase Bank also bought our mortgage; which screwed up my online bill pay processing for our home loan for a month or two.  After spending time on the phone and getting late fees reversed, I thought I was all set with our automated billing/payment.

Unfortunately, the customer service person who had helped me straighten out the online account for our mortgage had only solved a part of the problem.  When they added the home loan account they somehow “hid” the credit card account, which meant it no longer showed up online.

Chase Credit Card Late Payment

Since the credit card was hidden in the online interface, the electronic bill wasn’t sent to my  online bill pay company so I never received notice of what I owed.  I do have my credit card setup to send phone alerts when payments are paid or overdue so I was notified the day after the bill was due that Chase hadn’t received payment.  I also got another phone alert telling me that I had reached my credit limit.

Now, here’s the part where my heart leapt from my chest. 

I logged into my Chase account online to see what was going on and I saw the balance due was many thousands of dollars!  Of course I immediately thought someone had stolen our card and was on a shopping spree.  I couldn’t understand how the credit card company could have possibly let them spend that much money before cutting the card off.  We’re not talking 10K or 20K here, we’re talking a LOT of money that showed up on the balance due line.

Chase Customer Service

I dialed the phone number for Chase as fast as possible and I’m sure the lady on the other end of the line probably thought I was about to lose it.  After asking me a few questions, she pointed out that the bill I was looking at online was my mortgage bill, not my credit card bill.  Whew!

I could breathe again.  I was so used to logging into that account to see my credit card statement, I hadn’t even thought about the fact the balance due I saw could have been a home loan.  The customer service lady was reasonable and Chase waived the late fee and finance charges since they had made some sort of technical mistake that caused me not to get my bill.

Then she transferred me to the web department who looked at my account and let me know that somehow my credit card account had been “hidden” from online access.  They flipped a switch and right away I was able to see both types of statements.

So now I’m back on track with our online bill pay for both bills and am glad I didn’t have a heart attack during the few minutes I thought my credit card balance was as large as my mortgage payment.

I do get frustrated when big companies miss a detail in your account somewhere that causes you lost time and hassle.  I am glad that Chase was reasonable and refunded my late fees and I must admit she offered some of the best customer service I’ve had in about 8 months.  Luckily, I did have to break out my tips on how to beat bad customer 🙂

Ben Edwards, the founder of Money Smart Life, saved up enough to buy a Nintendo back when he was 12 years old. When he used the money to buy shares of Wal-Mart stock instead, he knew he wasn't like the other kids... His addiction to personal finance has paid off for his family and now he's helping you to afford the life that you want. Check him out on the web at Google Plus, Twitter and Facebook.

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