Complaint Review: Providian

All of a sudden within one billing statement period Providian starts charging my credit card account so-called "cash advance fees" of $10 apiece for separate bank ATM cash advances--three to be exact--in amounts as little as $20 apiece.

Those fees--NOT the cash advances themselves, mind you--put my account in "overlimit" status, generating yet another so-called "overlimit fee" of $35. First off, I never contracted with Providian to pay any such "cash advance" OR "overlimit" fees--in spite of the company's claim to inflict such fees with fleeting printed "notice."

Secondly, I sent the company my own WRITTEN notice and demand dated 21 May 2003 to either REVERSE all such fees or simply CLOSE THE SHYSTER ACCOUNT, specially since the company's automated system ought to automatically DECLINE any attempted charges to my account exceeding its credit limit. Otherwise any thief could misuse the account to charge fraudulently at will!

Further, I notified the shyster company in WRITING that any and all such fees would be duly subtracted from my account balance and would NOT be paid. Even further, I notified the shyster company to reply to my notice ONLY if they could read, comprehend and act--and that any action contrary to my own stated terms would be ignored and disregarded--my first and last word on the matter. READ AND COMPREHEND, I emphasized.

The RETARDS could do neither. All I got in response were two separate form letters from the company's "correspondence department" in Dallas, TX claiming that the fees were "correct" and would not be reversed. NO ACTION WAS TAKEN TO CLOSE THIS SHYSTER ACCOUNT AS DEMANDED. So perhaps this ripoff report will prompt this shyster company to finally READ AND COMPREHEND!!!!

Joseph Jr
Berkeley, California
U.S.A.