February 16,2009
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Protect Yourself from Flawed CC Dispute Law, Pt.2
The Sting.WaMu's explanation was highly dubious for a number of reasons: 1) The most glaring is the fact that the credit card issuing bank had allowed the time to expire to make a correction. Federal law provides only 60 days for filing or credit card dispute corrections. But WaMu had told the woman to wait 90 days and they would call her back. They never called her back. 2) The reason they gave for throwing the case out was that she had ‘checked a box' on the credit card dispute form signifying that the dispute was over "Possible Fraud' (duh???). The bank held that she should have used some kind of "Computer Error" or some kind of "Oversight". Both of these seem like a stretch to me.
In any case, the credit card charge would have to have been bogus because there's absolutely no evidence that it could be legitimate. But now, this woman is slammed with a bogus $858.38 credit card charge along with 9 months of finance charges.
What went wrong? Two big events occurred here. Both companies almost simultaneously ceased to exist in their current form: The merchant in question and the credit card issuer. The merchant – "Charles Keath", was taken over by The Swiss Colony Companies. The credit card issuer – "WaMu", was taken over by JPMorgan/Chase. Between all the confusion, procedure slipped through the cracks.
Now, the woman is chasing about the country, just trying to find out "Who's in charge, here?" It appears that the imminent economic collapse which is upon us is also creating a breakdown in law and order. Credit card consumer laws are experiencing ‘black-outs' as the lights flicker with our financial infrastructure.
The woman has been directed to a law firm in Chicago concerning the dealings with the merchant. No record has ever been found of the bogus purchase. As far as the credit card issuer, the JPMorgan/Chase bank has offered to continue researching the matter. However, at this writing, the bank still has not removed the charges from this dispute from the woman's active billable charges.
What can we do to protect ourselves from bogus credit card charges happening to us? Don't trust ‘em. Squawk loudly. Keep close tabs on the process. Perhaps vigilance is the only way.