Complaint Review: Equifax - Atlanta Georgia

I noticed a 7.95 charge on my bank statement in December 5, 2010 that I did not recognize.  I discovered it was an Equifax charge.  Upon further examinaton, I was very surprised to find that I had been charged 7.95 each month by Equifax beginning in April of 2010, for a total of 9 charges. 

When I called Equifax that same day (12-5-2010), they told me I had signed up their monitoring service.  I told them that I could not remember doing that.  She told me that I must have done so when I signed up for a free annual credit report from Equifax.  I asked the customer service agent if there was any way to check to see if I had ever accessed the service.  She responded there was. After a couple of minutes she told me that I had never accessed the website to utilize the service. 

I told her that that should prove I never realized I had signed up for anything, as I certainly would have accessed it if being charged 7.95 a month.  She agreed.  She told me that she felt there should be no problem in removing the 9 charges since it was evident I had not used the service and had not realized I had signed up for it.  

However, when I checked my checking account statement online maybe 5 days later, I noticed that I was only given a refund for 6 charges.   I called to complain and was told that they would review it and I would be contacted.  I was never contacted by them (though having an answering machine on my phone.

I contacted them again several times, including February 3rd, 2011.  On that date, I spoke with a regular agent and with a supervisor, who told me that he would request the additonal 3 charges be refunded.  He told me he saw no problem in this being done.   THE CHARGES WERE NOT REFUNDED (3 charges of 7.95 each for a total of 23.85). 

I contacted them again on February 15th and again took all the time to speak with a regular customer service agent and then with a supervisor.  This gentleman apologized for the much time that I had had to spend on this and for the charges not being returned, but assured me they would be returned.  He seemed very competent and extremely confident that the company would refund the charges to me.  I felt so sure that it would happen, I didn't even check to see. 

Howver, today (August 2, 2011), when I checked - I could not believe that Equifax had STILL NOT RETURNED the 23.85.   So, it took me another hour - speaking with Nathan in their customer care dept. before getting disconneced after 10 minutes.  Then I spoke with Fazco and it took 20 minutes to get a supervisor.  Then supervisor Sanjay spoke with me 5 minutes and said he felt he could get this taken care of.  He put me on hold for 20 minutes only to come back and say he would resubmit it to the billing department (which according to their records had declined to repay the charges 2 times already).

I am incredibly upset with Equifax.   I have spent probably 4 hours on phone calls with them.  I have been told since DECEMBER 5, 2010 that they would refund these charges.  And after many calls - and having been assured 2 times that 3 remaining charges totally 23.85 would be refunded, they have not.