Adam's Awesome Anecdotes

So, I recently changed the password on my Capital One website (trying to be a half way responsible end-user), however, I soon discovered (thanks to a notice from Mint.com which is my new hero), that I had failed to update my login info on my Bank of America website.  Now I admit this was my own fault, but honestly I don’t think this is that terribly intuitive of a thing to expect people to remember.  I’ll also admit, that I probably shouldn’t rely solely on the BOA bill pay reminders to pay my bills, but to Bank of America’s credit it has worked damn well for literally years.  

Well, it turns out that Bank of America decided to use their built-in, crappy website email to notify me they were having trouble with a bill.  Of course I didn’t see that and Capital One had no problem whatsoever hitting me with a $39 late fee (even though I have an excellent payment record.)  Which to Capital One’s credit they did remove the fee once I called in to pay the bill and complain.

So what did I feel I had to complain about you might ask since it technically was my fault (even if I was trying to take steps to help keep my online banking experience secure)?  Well, what I took issue with was that both Bank of America and Capital One have my work phone number, home phone number, cell number, email-2-sms address, and multiple email addresses (which they both SPAM regularly), yet somehow when something went wrong with my account they are virtually silent (except for the fee, of course).  Both websites support all kinds of alert options, but Capital One seems to be missing the “hey, let me know my bill is due and I haven’t paid yet” — mighty convenient when they charge exorbitant fees, and then BOA apparently can’t contact their customers when they have account trouble.  It’s not like this would incur huge expenses to shoot off an email or a text message and it really makes me wonder what kind of customer service I could expect should something more serious have been wrong with my account.  I clearly understand their motives behind their respective decisions, but still, since they do hold pretty much most of my money in the world, I would appreciate them trying a little harder to make it less evident that Corporate America has no problem fucking over its consumers.