Have you ever tried to cancel something on the phone

Tom 86

Tom 86

Senior Member
Location
Indiana
I got a credit card from my bank Friday for my WIFE who has been gone now for almost 7 years.

I called the credit card dept phone number. Talked to a real nice lady for about 5 minutes then said she can't cancel that you need to talk to another dept.?
To make a long story short I was on the phone for exactly 48 minutes as the timer at the top showed that. I was transferred to 7 different people, all said they can't do that I need to talk to this person.

Finally, at the 7th woman, she told me I need to take a "death certificate" to the bank so they can copy it & send it to me this number & then I'll cancel it. I asked how come they sent her one after she died almost 7 years ago & I took a death certificate to the bank a week after she passed? She said it's an automatic thing the computer does not have her D.C. in it?? :mad:

Doesn't one person know anything anymore?
 

Getting "customer service" over the phone is a real nuisance, anymore. Many companies have transferred their "service" to cheap labor foreign sites in recent years, and you are lucky if you get someone who speaks more than basic English.

Where a credit card is concerned, you might have better luck just going to the card/bank Web site, and "freezing" the account....to make sure that no one can "hack" the account with some bogus purchases or charges.
 
Tom 86 said:
I got a credit card from my bank Friday for my WIFE who has been gone now for almost 7 years.

I called the credit card dept phone number. Talked to a real nice lady for about 5 minutes then said she can't cancel that you need to talk to another dept.?
To make a long story short I was on the phone for exactly 48 minutes as the timer at the top showed that. I was transferred to 7 different people, all said they can't do that I need to talk to this person.

Finally, at the 7th woman, she told me I need to take a "death certificate" to the bank so they can copy it & send it to me this number & then I'll cancel it. I asked how come they sent her one after she died almost 7 years ago & I took a death certificate to the bank a week after she passed? She said it's an automatic thing the computer does not have her D.C. in it?? :mad:

Doesn't one person know anything anymore?
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It is amazing how many places simply do not know how to deal with an item out of the usual.
Being it has been so many years since your wife passed it is Odd the computer spits out a card etc.
If possible freeze the account and then perhaps turn the bank/ issuer in for possible fraud because you should NOT have to send in any more documentation at all. Even if an innocent mistake when they face finding out how the account came alive they might find something interesting.

It is THEIR job not yours to correct their system that somehow thinks death only lasts 7 years?
 
I had a terrible time with our dial-up service after my husband died. It was in his name and was being automatically paid from a charge card of his.

I wanted to cancel the card (the bank had no problem with that), get it in my name and set up payment on my charge card. Simple, I thought.

Oh, nooooooo...... You see, "only the account holder can make changes . " But he's dead! Wanna see the death certificate? "No, dead or not, only the account holder can make changes." But he can't......HE'S DEAD, DECEASED, GONE, DEAD, DEAD, DEAD!!!. Rinse and repeat. They couldn't deviate from the script.

It ended when I said the charge card was being canceled on Monday and they'd never get another cent. Suddenly, they discovered that they could indeed make the changes. Mmmmmhmmmmm.......
 
jujube said:
I had a terrible time with our dial-up service after my husband died. It was in his name and was being automatically paid from a charge card of his.

I wanted to cancel the car (the bank had no problem with that), get it in my name and set up payment on my charge card. Simple, I thought.

Oh, nooooooo...... You see, "only the account holder can make changes . " But he's dead! Wanna see the death certificate? "No, dead or not, only the account holder can make changes." But he can't......HE'S DEAD, DECEASED, GONE, DEAD, DEAD, DEAD!!!. Rinse and repeat. They couldn't deviate from the script.

It ended when I said the charge card was being canceled on Monday and they'd never get another cent. Suddenly, they discovered that they could indeed make the changes. Mmmmmhmmmmm.......
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amazing how fast policy changes when you say you will stop paying.....
 
You actually talked to a human? That's better than I usually do. I'm always transferred from one machine to another. They each ask for my account number and birthday and then ask me to press numbers for whatever I wanted and if what I wanted wasn't on the list I was in a fix. To make it worse they can't seem to understand a word I say. They ask me yes or no questions and can't understand even those simple words. I know I have a hillbilly twang but how badly can you say "no?"

After my father died I called a company that sent him magazines and said he was deceased -- a few days later we got a magazine addressed to Delmar Deceased.

Tom 86 said:
She said it's an automatic thing the computer does not have her D.C. in it?? :mad:
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Now that would have made me mad, too. I would have told her her software system must have a code for canceled cards so it must be her fault for not telling the computer the code.

Maybe we should take those credit cards of the deceased and have a spending spree. Then we could say we were sorry their computer didn't have the death certificate.
 
I cancelled several things (credit cards, subscriptions to anti-virus, remove her name from the house, etc) of my mother's after she passed away. I think I did have to send in a copy of the death certificate, I vaguely remember it had to be a certified copy and I worried I wouldn't have enough copies on hand but there were enough (I might have had 15, I got the quantity the funeral home recommended).
It is a good thing they make cancelling hard after a person dies because there are a lot of hostile people who would hurt others by cancelling their stuff. Where I work a disgruntled ex-spouse had scheduled a lot of million dollar tax payments under their ex-spouse's social security number and bank info, which I guess meant the person's bank kept having to reject (and probably charge a bounced payment fee) payments. Also the IRS was not amused.
 
Oh Ya! One time I got a deal with Sirius Radio for a new used car I bought. I ended up on the phone with someone from India that spent 1/2 hour trying to get me not to stop my subscription. I will never sign up for Sirius Radio again. I don't want to deal with someone from India and why do they not listen to me when I want to cancel my subscription. Most companies say that "the customer is right." What a bloody lie! The truth is that the bottom line of profit is what it's all about and to hack with the customers.
 
While it can be work to do the initial cancelling or changing of accounts after someone has passed ..... It should ONLY need to be done once per account not again and again.
the OP said his wife was gone almost 7 years .... he provided the bank proof once years ago.

This is either fraud or incompetence both the bank should be held accountable.
It should never be the families problem that each time a bank / card company runs through every previous customer and decides to send a NEW card or UP the limit to prove once again the customer is no longer here.
Same goes with fraud people on phone trying to sell stuff based off some list they bought and they have zero idea that half are deceased.

It is frustrating for family and many end up doing the leg work for the Bank etc.
when it is clearly not going to matter as they did not record information CORRECTLY the first time.

My mom went through this with my dads stuff.
She was called non stop regarding an account or a item he purchased ( he did neither he had been dead for years).
I updated his address and phone number to the cemetery ....... got a phone call in a day going " wait he is dead ?" ....... "who owes us money ?"

Told them .... "I have no idea ............but maybe if they had requested ID or proof of life instead.......... of screaming at mom to prove otherwise maybe they could know who ripped them off. "
 
Lewkat said:
the person who invented the automated phone service should have been shot on the spot
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Yes! I just keep saying 'operator' in answer to every question and usually that gets me to a real person pretty quickly.

But I like the voice recognition feature of Fidelity's automated phone service, on the other hand it records my answer to what I'm calling about and I hear it play my answer to the real human and I always feel embarrassed cause I sound like an idiot.
 
Yes, my mother passed away on November 9, and I'm the beneficiary of her estate. Her bank account still isn't closed because B of A wouldn't close it (even though I am named as the beneficiary) and now it can't be closed until Social Security reclaims their check. Her insurance company has advised they will only issue a refund check in her name, even though I faxed them a copy of her will with me named as the beneficiary. Don't talk to me about customer service.:mad:

And why do we always have to input the pertinent information into the touchpad, then the person that picks up the phone asks for it all over again?
 
shedevil7953 said:
Not since Covid. Anyone you talk to for customer support takes forever or as you said, transfers you to several other people who can't help. I've also noticed if I talk to different people about the same problem, you'll get a different answer!
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That was happening a looong time before Covid. If I call Kaiser Permanente about something, I have to give all my info to the person and describe what I need, then they say they will transfer me to someone else. I wait on hold and somebody gets online and asks all my info again, after wasting more time with them they tell me they will transfer the call to someone in my state, and if I get disconnected to call again. That game can go on for a long time.

That was happening years ago before the pandemic. Trying to call up a local store to see if they have something before you take the drive over there, and the sales person says yes, they have it in stock. You get there and they say they don't have it. When you ask why the person on the phone said they did, they shrug their shoulders.

When I get good service from someone, I sometimes will take the time to speak with their manager and give a good word about them.
 
dseag2 said:
advised they will only issue a refund check in her name
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That is really frustrating. I sympathize a lot because my mom's bank is still after several years trying to refund my mom a hundred dollars (I think ordered by some class-action court case they lost) but they will only put the check in her name. I send them to my brother because he was the executor but he just tells me he doesn't have that bank account anymore (whatever that means). He doesn't care about the money because he has enough of his own, but I keep getting reminders from the bank about the uncashed check and I'm so frustrated I can't get my half.
 
Marie5656 said:
When dealing with things after Rick died, cancelling his credit card was the most difficult. Lots of hoops to jump through. One person said they needed to confirm with HIM to close the account!! Umm...he died.
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How stupid are these people?
 
It is all overand yes well before the pandemic but that excuse is being used
I worked for a HEALTH insurance company ..... spent all day attaching documentation to files to do this sort of thing ...... they sent in death certificates to cancel policy and stop payments ........................................... but our system OFTEN took out auto payments for 3-6 months before having to go back in to reimburse the estate. (Part of the reason i would not want auto payments to some of these companies)
It was complete INCOMPETENCE nothing too hard

I could have updated files as soon as i attached document and made notes regarding customer is DEAD............
but that was another groups job.............. worthless group spent more days planning potlucks then DOING their job
 
dseag2 said:
Yes, my mother passed away on November 9, and I'm the beneficiary of her estate. Her bank account still isn't closed because B of A wouldn't close it (even though I am named as the beneficiary) and now it can't be closed until Social Security reclaims their check. Her insurance company has advised they will only issue a refund check in her name, even though I faxed them a copy of her will with me named as the beneficiary. Don't talk to me about customer service.:mad:

And why do we always have to input the pertinent information into the touchpad, then the person that picks up the phone asks for it all over again?
Click to expand...
Sometimes I think the banks are acting stupid because they don't really want us to come in. It saves them money. A few weeks ago I went to my bank to transfer a little bit of cash from a savings account to my chequing account. I had to talk to 4 different people to get this done. It's worse than communist Russia and I told them so. I have done this same type of transaction on my computer in about 3 minutes. Some banks really "SUCK."
 

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