U.S. Bankcard Center

Review: sales person misrepresented services. said funds would be in my bank acct next day. takes 48 hours . lie # 1. said there is no contract it is on a month to month period. when called to complain I was told there was a3 year contract. lie # 2. I was told i'm paying a certain percentage to the ompany I had and fees that he will not charge or be lower. I called my old company and was told for 1 fee all I have to do is fill out a form and that fee goes away. and percentage is lower then he said I was paying also. lie # 3. last night they took a early termination fee out of my acct. as I was lied to about a contract and that I am a [redacted] not principal I have no authority to sign a contract I want my money back right away.Desired Settlement: refund of funds taken from my bank acct. of 295.00

Business

Response:

We received and reviewed complaint #[redacted] filed by [redacted] of State Supply of Florida. In reading his complaint,

we are confused by a number of issues he brings up. He states he was told funds would be available in 24hrs. Our standard

Review: About a year ago a sales rep from US Bankcard Center came to our place of business and sold us our credit card machine. Just recently we were forced to cancel business with them due to the fact we were being charged $36.00 a month and not doing any credit card business, let alone much buisness in general, it came down to the fact that we just couldn't afford it anymore. Throughout my cancellation process of 3 or 4 phone calls, no one had ever mentioned to us that we were locked in a 3 year contract with them and would be charged an early termation fee of $295.00. 10 days after cancelling our account, the $295.00 was taken from our bank account, when I called to ask why, this is when they informed me of the 3 year contract and that they had no obligation to tell us because it was in the stated in the contract. Well, maybe they don't have an obligation but it would have been a nice courtesy to let us as their customer know this. Our contract is a photocopy of the original whom I assume the sales rep. has. You have to read it with a magnifying glass to begin with and the statement that tells you about the 3 year contract is in a paragraph which states all the rates and fees that certain credit card issuers such as American Express, Discover and etc. charge. This 3 year contract and the early termination fee was NEVER VERBALIZED to us by our sales rep, which makes me feel like they purposely don't mention it. I have made several phone calls trying to resolve this and get some sort of satisfaction but I keep getting someone's voicemail and when I ask to speak to the next person in a higher position I just keep getting brushed on the next represenative. I also asked if I could get a number to call to get a hold of the gentleman that sold us our "contract" and no one was able to give me any information on how to get in touch with him, which bothered me because this man supposedly works for this company but they themselves don't know how to reach him?Desired Settlement: We would like the $295.00 refunded to us. If this termination fee or 3 YEAR contract was mentioned to us when we first signed the contract and/or in the cancellation process then I wouldn't be writing this complaint now. I feel the way they went about this was very conniving and if nothing else gets resolved from this well at least I can inform other consumers of their shady business practices. I have made many attempt to resolve this with the company themselves and they don't seem interested in doing so.

Business

Response:

We have reviewed the complaint from [redacted] as well as the history of his account here at US Bankcard Center. He is requesting

a refund of the early termination fee of $295 which is printed and signed for on his contract with us.

Review: In March 2013, [redacted], a sale representative from US Bankcard Center came to our restaurant and misled me to sign a contract with her by giving us wrong information. She gave us a comparison of the existing service rate, provided by Transfirst, and her company’s rate. She also stated that we could try the service for the first couple months with no obligation, which should mean that there should be no termination fees within the first couple months.

After the first month, I found that the information of previous bank she gave us was wrong. According to the comparison sheet, [redacted] claimed that “Visa/Mastercard Transaction Fee” charged by Transfirst is 20 cent while the actual fee is only 10 cent, “Monthly Statement Fee” charged by Transfirst is 9.00 dollars while there is actually none. When I found out about this issue, I immediately contacted [redacted] regarding the cancelation of the service. She tried to give me an option of lower the rate to match the rate of what we get from the previous provider. However, due to the fact that she was not upfront about the information she gave me in the first place, I insisted that I want to cancel the service. She later told me to wait until she got more information regarding the cancelation from her company’s headquarter. A few days later, I called her again about the progress of the issue, and she told me that, according to the information she got from her company, I will be able to cancel the service anytime with no termination fee. She also told me to wait until the bill for the first month of service is issued, and then I can cancel the service at any time. Few weeks later, the bill was issued. I contacted her again, and she neither answered my call nor called me back. After trying to contact her for about two weeks, she answered my phone call. This time she told me she has no idea of the cancelation request, and also told me to contact the customer care department myself in order to cancel the service. When I called the customer care department about the cancelation, a representative named [redacted] told me that, based on the application I signed, I have to pay the termination fee if I want to terminate the service before the end of the initial three years of service. He also told me that he had no idea about what the sale representative told me and he and his department will not take any responsibility for these issue. After talking with customer care representative, I tried to contact [redacted] again with the expectation that she is authorized to cancel the service and honor the promise she has made with me when I signed the contact. Until now, three weeks since I talked with the customer care, I have been trying to contact her and she has never answered my phone call and never given me a call back. On May [redacted] 2013, I decided to block any further charge from US Bankcard Center.

According to the above information, I am writing to you to dispute the validity of the contract, termination fee and any further charges from the US Bankcard Center, as their representative seems to intentionally lure me into signing the contract by providing false information. This is proven from the fact that [redacted] intentionally delayed to resolve the issue, and denied any responsibility to the issue happened.Desired Settlement: According to the above information, I am writing to you to dispute the validity of the contract, termination fee and any further charges from the US Bankcard Center, as their representative seems to intentionally lure me into signing the contract by providing false information. This is proven from the fact that [redacted] intentionally delayed to resolve the issue, and denied any responsibility to the issue happened.

Business

Response:

Dear [redacted],

I am sorry to hear that you feel your experience was

anything less than exceptional. As a

leader in credit card processing, it is important to us that this concern is

reviewed thoroughly.

Upon review of the documentation that was submitted to our

company in April of 2013, I was able to determine that you are correct, the

transaction fee for your account was $0.17 cents per transaction, and $5.00 a

month for the statement fee, as per the signed Rates and Fees page of your

application.

When Spoon Thai called to express their concerns, our Customer

Care department recognized an opportunity to help to deliver end-to-end satisfaction,

and offered to perform a rate review on the account, which would assess if

there were a way to provide any additional savings over and above what was originally

agreed upon by the representative and Spoon Thai.

Our request to assist with the merchants concerns was actually

denied by Spoon Thai, as we were advised that they had already reprogrammed

their credit card machine back to their old Credit Card Processer, not permitting

us an opportunity to assist.

Upon reviewing all account documentation, I was also unable

to locate any documentation authorizing a waiver of the standard three year

term processing agreement that Spoon Thai signed.

With excellent service and merchant empowerment being the pinnacle

of our every consideration, we would like to affirm those beliefs by absorbing

the cost for cancellation of all systems on this merchant’s behalf.

Our merchant support team strongly believes in our product

and service and is committed to ensuring that the merchant experience is always

the first consideration.

Thanks you for taking the time to express your concerns and

we look forward to your satisfaction.

Manager of Merchant Support

Consumer

Response:

I have reviewed the response made by the business in reference to complaint ID [redacted], and find that this resolution is satisfactory to me and the matter has been resolved.

Sincerely,

Review: I have been with the company for over 3 years and since my deposit bank account for the Bankcard has been low on funds. So if they took out there fees and there was not enough funds in the account they would put my account on hold and when I charged my next credit card they would hold the funds from me for how ever long and will release once I call in. Well this last time they held my funds for over 2 weeks and said they can hold it for how ever long and will release only if I call in. I have been sick and have not been in my office to deal with this and was depending on my account to be cleared with those funds. Well now my bank hit me with extra fees and they tried to take out more fees in the begining of the month. How is that possible if they have my funds in their possesion surpassing the fees they charged me again to my account. I told them I need a letter for my bank stating the amount and how they have been holding my funds. They refused and stated it is in my contract that they do not provide a letter. I just looked over my contract it does not state it anywhere. They have finally released my funds, but my bank wants a letter from them about the situation and they refuse. This company is not for its clients and have several lies in their contract. I still want my letter for the bank!Desired Settlement: I want a letter from the company stating the day I charged my card and for how much and how they have been holding my funds to give to my bank.

Business

Response:

We have read the complaint from [redacted]. In the complaint, the merchant states that this has happened to their account in the past and funds were released when they called in to our company. This is exactly what happened in this instance as well. There is no letter to be sent as this issue is, as the merchant observes, no different than any of the other instances where they did not have funds available in their checking account to pay for their end of month fees. The merchant states that they are aware that this has happened numerous times and, to clarify, this is actually not a normal occurrence and actually means we did not receive payment for our services when due. When the end of month fees are debited from their bank account, we receive notice back that there are not enough funds to pay for the debit. Instead of closing the account for non payment, as a courtesy we will keep the account open and it goes on reserve. When the merchant processes transactions, payments to his bank are diverted to the reserve account to satisfy the outstanding balance. This can take a few days or weeks depending on when the merchant processes sales on the account. In this particular instance, it took a few weeks for the merchant to process funds in excess of the amount owed. The account is put on reserve automatically when an NSF notice comes from their bank. The release process is a manual process as it must be reviewed by a risk representative in order to review the account to verify there are no other issues and then the release takes place. At times, because this is a manual process, additional batches may get caught up in the reserve process. As the merchant stated, when he called in, the funds were released. I want to make it clear that this issue only occurred because the merchant did not have enough funds in their bank account to pay what they owed for our services. This has happened numerous times in the past and, as I write this response, the merchant has actually again rejected the fees owed to us--this time for October's fees due November *. The account will once again go through the reserve process only due to the actions of the merchant. We would prefer to collect our fees as agreed upon in the original merchant contract. The reserve process is a courtesy extended to the merchant to allow the account to stay open so they can pay what is owed. The merchant can keep this from ever happening in the future by keeping enough funds in their bank account to pay the fees they have incurred during the month.