My wife and i differentiate our cards based on the color and know one is due on the 1st and the other the 15th. Now it is difficult to keep track of which is which. As banks and credit card companies seem to be looking for any way to increase profit it would seem like this failry innocent “lost information” scenario gave them the opportunity to try some tricks.

I was unable to pay my balance on-line during the Lost Information period, although I am on a e-billing system. I was not notified by mail or by phone by Citicard and only realized this once I logged on to my account. I had to pay by phone for which they tried to charge me. The next month I went on-line and it showed a zero balance, so I did not make a payment. I just checked yesterday and it said I was past due, they jacked my APR to 25% and charged me about $60 in finance charges and late fees.

When confronted they stated that I had missed a payment of 17.00 to which I replied that the website, my e-bill showed a zero balance. To my surprise they indicated that many customers were experiencing the same problem. To ensure my APR be reset, the late fees and finance charge creditted I opened a new Capitol One card and suggested I would transfer my balance. This seemed to do the trick as they were amenable to all my requests.

My last concern is whether the late payment was sent to the credit bureaus and what about my interst rate going up on other lines of credit? I will be following up with Citicards Credit reporting division today and will updat this thread when I know more. I have been a card member for 13 years and have never missed a payment ever. My e-bill showed a zero balance and so I didn’t make a payment.

I just found out about my card being compromised. While I appreciate Citibank acting proactively by issuing a new card, I do not appreciate how I was notified. (A phone call would have been nice just to let me know that a new card was being issued to replace my old card, followed by more formal communication such as a letter.) I found out about the problem initially when I went to check information on-line to ensure that my transactions were correct. (I check my account on-line very frequently, as once I was double-billed by a company. The company told Citi Cards that both charges were correct — when they weren’t — but Citibank still sided with the merchant. The merchant subsequently reversed both charges after I went to the company president.)

I think it is absolutely horrendous that MY credit card company will not reveal HOW MY information was compromised. We should have an expectation that our financial information is protected by the merchants that we use. If that trust is broken, we should be told who broke that trust. That way, we can also have some idea about what other personal information might have been compromised.

Thanks