Fifth Third Bank Discontinuation of statements to hide increased minimum payments and charge late fees. Cincinnati, Ohio

Thank you for joining the discussion. As I've read through other reports relating to Fifth Third, I've noticed that besides Robert your name also comes up frequently to rebut consumer complaints. I was beginning to think you didn't have anything to add for my case.

Perhaps you missed some pertinent information, so allow me to summarize in a perhaps more succinct manner:

- This was never a matter of knowing when payments were due. E-mail notifications of payment due sufficed for this purpose, and I have been receiving such e-mails since July 2010.

- Until my job transition in June of 2011, I had made a practice of making payments as soon as I was able rather than waiting for a statement. It did not seem unusual to not get a statement when no payment was due.

- Internet banking did not show this account. Our checking and savings account have both my name and my wife's name on them and show for my wife's internet login. The credit card is in my name. Whether information was available to me can not be checked retrospectively because Fifth Third removed all traces of the credit account when they closed the account.

- Phone information regarding account balances requires access to the account number. I do not have the account number because I do not use the card for purchases, and most likely it is in boxes in storage that I haven't moved to our house we moved to in Novemebr 2010.

- I have been in contact with Fifth Third customer service, who indicate they have my correct address and at no point has my account been set to only deliver statements electronically.

- I have received all other notices and statements from Fifth Third for our checking and savings account, and I've received notices other than statements for the credit card account.

- In spite of informing Fifth Third that I am not receiving statements on three calls to customer service made since October 13, I did not receive a statement for October 28. I did not even know I should expect a statement until a November 2 call to customer service I was informed that a payment was due on November 3. Once again, a statement would be the ONLY way I could know this because at this point, the account does not show online and I do not even receive e-mail notification that payment is due since the account is closed.

- For extra credit: According to Fifth Third I should have known that a minumum payment of $25 is required unless my balance is under $25, and I should have known this because it was in an update I was sent regarding changes to terms and conditions. However, I have documentation which contradicts this claim because it shows that I had a $10 minimum payment due in July 2010 when I had a balance of $281. A more recent credit report shows a history of minimum payment of $10 up to November 2010 when for the first time the minimum payment is reported as $25.

- Let's also emphasize one more thing: This wasn't a postal error of one or two statements not being delivered. This was every single statement for a long period of time.

Here's the bottom line. A reasonable consumer places a level of trust in their banks as I did in assuming that something like a payment due would be communicated to me by a monthly statement without my having had to request it. Maybe the fact that I wasn't receiving statements should have raised a flag sooner that Fifth Third was trying to sneak something through without me noticing.

Make no mistake, I am fully aware that Fifth Third has a built-in get-out-of-jail card because their terms and services have the clause that states (paraphrased) "Fifth Third reserves the right to change terms and conditions without notice, and continued use of the account by the consumer indicates acceptance of such changes."

Make no mistake, Fifth Third did try to sneak something through. There's a difference between legal and right. My biggest mistake was putting more trust in my bank than it deserved.

Ok, I can't say that you received a statement or not, but it is your responsibility to make sure your bills are paid on time. Just because you didn't get a statement for whatever reason, doesn't mean that it isn't due. Last time I checked, banks had phone numbers and websites just in case you didn't get the statement in the mail. This is nothing but negligence.

Robert, I am curious what your interest is in defending Fifth Third. Are you vetting complaints as a hobby, looking for cases or in a position of having a business interest in defending Fifth Third?

No, I am not implying I am outright asking why when you didn't get a statement how come you did not call to find out the payment information?  While you would not have gotten a replacement statement in time, they could have told you what the Minimum payment was, and probably told you the reason you did not get a statement(such as you opted-in to Paperless Statements).

Regarding the last point first, to this date there has been no explanation why I did not get statements. I have not opted out of paper statements and according to conversations I have had with Fifth Third customer service I should have received statements. There is nothing in their system preventing delivery of notices, as I have received all checking statements by mail and all other notices related to all accounts, including my credit account, have been successfully delivered by both e-mail notification and snail mail.

Regarding the question as to why I didn't inquire about not getting a statement, quite frankly I have no idea how long I have not been getting statements. When I obtained past statements, I requested and received 6 months of statements. My oldest of these statements was from June when I had been making payments without waiting for payment to be due, so at that point I assumed that maybe I just hadn't been receiving statements because I had been keeping up and I really never had a use for the statement.

Why I didn't pursue statements or telephone information as to my minimum balance is a question I doubt I would answer to your satisfaction. What I knew was that I was making payments when I was told. I did not receive notices that my account was past due, and I did not receive statements. I only received a notice that a payment was due, and on my online checking I was that payment was made.

My question as to whether you're vetting legal cases, defending Fifth Third, or just an interested reader becomes relevant to my next point here: I have not made any claim that there is a case here that is solid enough to hold up in a court of law. For all intents and purposes, there is very likely a clause in the fine print that says Fifth Third can decide one day to charge a $500 fee for every transaction, and as long as they put it on an updated terms and conditions and CLAIM they mailed the notice, there is nothing I can do except take my business elsewhere and by not taking my business elsewhere, I accept the change to the terms and conditions.

Looking at the situation from a legal standpoint, Fifth Third will always have an out because they have a clause in their terms and conditons that says exactly that: they can change terms and conditions at will and the customer either closes their accounts or implies acceptance.

This is about perceived fairness from the lay point of view.

Again I further point out that Fifth Third, by reporting on a monthly basis that my account was okay, undermines their own position that it is past due.

I will also further point out that my third and most recent call to them on November 2nd was the first I was informed that a payment was due on November 3rd. Once again, I did not receive a November statement. My first call to customer service on this matter was on October 1st, and at that time I informed them that I was not receiving statements. Apparently contacting the bank is not effective in resolving the statement non-delivery issue.

Also, amazingly enough, I was told at that time that my past due balance was $166 and change. At my next opportunity I sent a payment of $200, which processed weeks ago. Fifth Third in my conversations yesterday still takes the position that my current status is that the account is past due. With the payment the account is well below the limit.

Accessing the automated information by phone was problematic as it required the full account number.

My wife handles the bills, and Fifth Third logins utilize debit card numbers. When she logged in because the card was in my name (since it was openned when the accounts were openned while I started work in Indiana before she moved from Michigan) What this means is the account was not visible to her online, aside from it having been setup to make bill payments where it only showed as the last 4 digits. We did not have statements from which we could gleen the full account number. The actual card was not something we kept handy because we did not use it for purchases.

The bottom line is we did not have a source for the full account number.

Again you missed the point.  The payment history as you posted and I explained shows why the 30 day late appears valid.  You had failed to make the minimum payment for a couple of payment cycles.  While I can't tell exactly it looks like even a 60 day late may be a valid listing.

And as I said I conceded that to the letter of the law I don't disagree. But had I known the minimum payment because I had a statement to tell me what it is, then I wouldn't even be here.

Measure this from the viewpoint of a reasonable lay person. A reasonable lay person expects to receive statements. That did not happen. I had no indication that our payment we were making was anything other than kosher until the day we received a letter that the account was cancelled for late payment, which was a complete surprise because to the best of my knowledge we were provided a date upon which payment was due, and we had been making the payment on or before that date aside from a single exception.

- I have never seen a Credit Card with a Grace period.  If the due date is the 3rd, if they receive the payment on the 4th you are late.  In fact if the due date is 5PM on the 3rd if you pay it at 5:01PM on the third you are late.

What is your point? Payments were due on the 3rd and except for one were made on the 3rd. I was correcting my earlier mis-statement that payments were due on the 6th. The event that occurred on the 6th was that the late fee posted to the account, according to the statements I received from the branch when I requested them.

 And in 2010 the Government put in new regulations that as a result caused many credit card issuers to increase their minimum payments due.

Dodd-Frank was signed into law in July 2010, yes, but many banks pursued compliance well ahead of that. Fifth Third issued a revision to their terms and conditions some time in 2009. It was the change to terms and conditions in 2009 which was cited by the customer service rep Brie during my most recent phone conversation. The 2009 terms and conditions is where she claimed the $25 minimum payment went into effect for Fifth Third and it was that terms and conditions notice that she claimed I should have been aware of the $25 minimum payment even if I did not receive statements.

However, I have documentation which contradicts this assertion. According to a snapshot I had taken of my credit report in July 2010, I had at the point of the snapshot a balance of $281, a most recent actual payment of something like $115 and a payment amount of $10.

When Fifth Third closed my credit account, I lost access to any of the information that may have been available regarding the account online. I can't say what my statement said going back to July 2010 unless I pay a fee for them to retrieve records from archives.

So let me make the point clear.  The reason you are in this situation is your failure to take responsibility on your account, and taking several assumptions that were wrong.  The only valid complaint you MAY have is for not getting the statement for the first month.  But when you didn't get one the second..and subsequent months it is YOUR responsibility to find out why.  After all how would ANY bank know anything is wrong if you don't call them?

And I will again reiterate that I have not disputed that in retrospect I had made faulty assumptions. I would expect that a reasonable person would have to concede that I had no reason to suspect that the payments I had made were anything other than compliant in lieu of statements I should have received.

I think I've also explained how your assertions that communication with the bank would have corrected the problem, as clearly I infomed the bank with adequate notice for a statement I should've received within the past week, and in spite of such notice no statement was delivered and the bank continues to assert that nothing in the system indicates a delivery problem.

If you're implying that we somehow thought maybe we had a higher minimum payment, we did not. If we had knowledge of the actual minimum payment,we would have paid at least that.
- No, I am not implying I am outright asking why when you didn't get a statement how come you did not call to find out the payment information?  While you would not have gotten a replacement statement in time, they could have told you what the Minimum payment was, and probably told you the reason you did not get a statement(such as you opted-in to Paperless Statements).

It is relevant to my dispute with the claim on my credit report that I am 30 days delinquent. 2 days or 5 days, the point is conceded that the $25 late fee is valid, but it does not equate a 30 day delinquency being reported to a credit agency.
- Again you missed the point.  The payment history as you posted and I explained shows why the 30 day late appears valid.  You had failed to make the minimum payment for a couple of payment cycles.  While I can't tell exactly it looks like even a 60 day late may be a valid listing.

I will correct an earlier statement, my due date has been on the 3rd of each month, it is on the 6th of each month that the late fee shows on my statement.
- I have never seen a Credit Card with a Grace period.  If the due date is the 3rd, if they receive the payment on the 4th you are late.  In fact if the due date is 5PM on the 3rd if you pay it at 5:01PM on the third you are late.

No other credit card, INCLUDING this one based on prior minimum payments from 2010 when I had a minimum payment reflected on a credit report of $10, has had a higher minimum payment due for a $500 balance.
- And in 2010 the Government put in new regulations that as a result caused many credit card issuers to increase their minimum payments due.

So let me make the point clear.  The reason you are in this situation is your failure to take responsibility on your account, and taking several assumptions that were wrong.  The only valid complaint you MAY have is for not getting the statement for the first month.  But when you didn't get one the second..and subsequent months it is YOUR responsibility to find out why.  After all how would ANY bank know anything is wrong if you don't call them?

 The main question that has to be asked is why if you didn't get a statement did you not call up(or check the Web Site) to find out
a)Why you didn't get a statement
b)What your minimum payment was
c)When your payment was due?

You also state that your wife got an e-mail notification that a payment was due.  So again why didn't you or her confirm the amount?

There was never a question of when the payment was due, an e-mail arrived on the 26th of each month stating, in these exact words (with account information removed) "The minimum payment for your credit card account x**** is due on September 03, 2011."

What reasonable logistic allows for the delivery of a replacement statement within 7 days?  This is not enough time for a replacement statement to be delivered by mail, and bank hours overlap our work hours.

I've assessed the timeframe between receiving my statement and the due date for all other charge accounts, no other account I have gives less than 14 days between the date the statement arrives in my mailbox and the date that the payment is due.

I will correct an earlier statement, my due date has been on the 3rd of each month, it is on the 6th of each month that the late fee shows on my statement.

I had written this report up without submitting it as I wanted to make one final attempt at resolution with customer service, but the call did not change anything hence I posted this report. The delivery of statements is in dispute because nothing from Fifth Third's perspective indicates that there was a problem with the delivery of statements. Fifth Third has the correct address, and in the statements I received from the bank it shows correctly, and Fifth Third indicates they have not received returned statements. Fifth Third does not show that  any options had been selected which would have resulted in the statements not being delivered by mail.

From my perspective, we did not receive the statements. It is clear that Fifth Third is capable of sending mail to us because we have never had any missed statements from our checking account or savings account, and those mailings do not include the credit account statement. We also have received other letters.

- It wouldn't have mattered if you paid $25 on the 8th, the due date was the 6th and you would have still been charged a late fee.

I can't dispute the validity of this particular late fee, I am providing a complete timeline. It is relevant to my dispute with the claim on my credit report that I am 30 days delinquent. 2 days or 5 days, the point is conceded that the $25 late fee is valid, but it does not equate a 30 day delinquency being reported to a credit agency.

- Why did you increase your amount?  You said you were not getting statements and  based your minimums on others so wouldn't you have paid the $15 from the previous month?

At no point did I state that my intent in paying credit cards is to always make a minimum payment. In general unless we are in a belt-tightening situation we pay more than the minimum on all credit bills, and prioritize one bill to maximize our payment. The payment made on July 8th was made from a dead zone in our household income where there was no paycheck incoming from my employment, and could not be made until my wife's bi-weekly paycheck depositted on July 8. Her previous paycheck was on June 24, and went to groceries and other bills, by the time on the 26th we were notified by e-mail of a payment due, the June 24 paycheck was spoken for.

On the other hand, the August 3 payment came once my paycheck was back in effect and on a bi-weekly basis was being deposited on alternate weeks, so every week somebody's paycheck was being deposited, so we were able to pay more than what we believed was the minimum amount due.

If you're implying that we somehow thought maybe we had a higher minimum payment, we did not. If we had knowledge of the actual minimum payment, we would have paid at least that.

For what ever reason you just "assumed" what the minimum payment was and you know what happens when you do that.  Nothing you described here would have been any different if it happened with another Credit Card.   So unfortunately the main responsibility for this has to lie with you.

I wholeheartedly disagree. No other credit card has every repeatedly had a failure to deliver monthly statements. No other credit card has ever had such a short period between the statement and the due date. No other credit card, INCLUDING this one based on prior minimum payments from 2010 when I had a minimum payment reflected on a credit report of $10, has had a higher minimum payment due for a $500 balance.

On that point, I'm going by memory but I'd need to recheck that history to be more certain. It's a relevant point if my memory is correct and I had a $10 minimum payment at any time in 2010, during my phone conversation with customer service today they asserted that I should have known that a $25 minimum payment is always due unless my balance is less than $25 because it was stated in a 2009 update to my terms and conditions which I was sent. I know in a strictly legal conversation, fine print counts, but in common usage it's a poor excuse because an update to terms and conditions is fine print, and as such many people don't read it. And certainly 2 years later it's not reasonable to expect it to be something an average consumer would have in their recollection.

In fact, I have had credit cards in the past that have had isolated incidences of losing a statement, and I have never had a problem working with the respective banks in those instances to reverse the charges that resulted. So once again, that would be another instance of where it would, indeed, have been different had it happenned with another credit card.

To the letter of the contract, it's hard to argue that I'm right.  Arguing the letter of the law here, however, misses the point. Fifth Third has made a practice of changing the rules of the game.

Without statements, we did not have information on Fifth Third's minimum payments so we made minimum payments based on the minimum payments that 3 other credit cards with $500 balance charged.
- The main question that has to be asked is why if you didn't get a statement did you not call up(or check the Web Site) to find out
a)Why you didn't get a statement
b)What your minimum payment was
c)When your payment was due?

You also state that your wife got an e-mail notification that a payment was due.  So again why didn't you or her confirm the amount?

June 3, 2011, a payment was made of $112.50 when a payment was due on June 6, this was the last statement date a late fee was not charged. July 8, 2011 a payment of $15 was made after I received my first paycheck from my new job, the payment date was July 6. After the fact I learned that the minimum payment was $25. I was charged a $25 late payment fee.
- It wouldn't have mattered if you paid $25 on the 8th, the due date was the 6th and you would have still been charged a late fee.

 

The statement balance was $395.60 (My limit is $500) August 3 a payment of $20 was made. Payment was due August 6. I was charged a $35 late fee.
- Why did you increase your amount?  You said you were not getting statements and  based your minimums on others so wouldn't you have paid the $15 from the previous month?  You were charged a late fee again because you did not pay the minimum due, which not only included the  $10 under the minimum from July, the Minimum for August, and the $25 Late fee from the previous month ($10 + $25 + $25). 

Unbeknownst to me also was the fact that the minimum payment was $60. The statement balance was $479.19 September 6 a payment of $15 was made.
- See the pattern yet?  Your paying less than the minimum and that is just carrying over.  Then on one hand say you don't get statements but even though you are basing your minimums on other cards your minimum changes every month.  One could expect that they would only go down, but you paid $15, $20, $15?

 Just based on this pattern it appears that the credit reporting 30 days late is accurate.

For what ever reason you just "assumed" what the minimum payment was and you know what happens when you do that.  Nothing you described here would have been any different if it happened with another Credit Card.   So unfortunately the main responsibility for this has to lie with you.