Why I just cut up my JC Penney credit card

No, it wasn't because of the usurious interest rate. I paid the card off every month so that wasn't a concern. It wasn't even because they screwed up my account and began charging me "late fees" for a pathetically tiny balance that resulted from a charge of something like $1.92 that they mistakenly applied to my card when it was actually at zero balance. Admittedly, the fact that they reported me to the credit bureaus for not paying this $1.92 and the associated late fees, which reached $48.92 before I caught this and called them to figure out WTF was going on did have something to do with it. That was probably the thing that motivated me to cut the card and close the account. But what made me madder than a legless Ethiopian watching a donut roll down a hill--and what made me decide to close the account and blog about it--was the fact that when I called JC Penney customer service to sort this out, the girl who answered the phone made it quite clear to me that they don't care enough about their regular customers to actually try to make amends for errors that they caused which actually harm their customers beyond the point of mere aggravation.

Starting at the beginning, I'd last used my JC Penney card at the Martinsburg, West Virginia store back in July of this year. When the August bill came around, I paid the card off, just as I've done many times before. I paid it off in full and on time and went about my business. I admit that I didn't pay attention to any subsequent bills that JC Penney sent me in the following months. Why should I? I had paid the card off and if I even noticed any mail correspondence from them, I merely assumed that I was just getting statements reflecting that zero balance.

Well I saw one in today's mail and opened it, and was shocked to see a "balance owed" of $48.92. What the hell?! I logged onto their rather user-unfriendly website to see if I'd made a purchase that I didn't remember and saw a history of late charges ($10.00 per month) and finance charges (an extra dollar each month) all apparently stemming from a $1.92 charge applied in August. I know that I didn't buy anything for $1.92 so I called their 800 number. The girl who answered checked the account, confirmed that I'd made no purchases and further confirmed that until the $1.92 has been applied, my account had been at zero balance. She was at a loss as to what the $1.92 was all about or why JC Penney had charged me that odd amount, but she took away all the charges and told me that she would send notice to the credit bureaus telling them that I no longer was in arrears.

Now that was when I hit the ceiling. Without so much as a courtesy phone call, JC Penney has contacted the credit reporting services and reported me as being delinquent for not paying them $1.92 which I never owed in the first place and $47.00 in late fees and finance charges on that $1.92! So my credit rating took a sock in the nose courtesy of JC Penney, and even though they now say that I no longer owe them anything, there's still a black mark on my credit record that any potential future lenders or employers may see and wonder about.

I asked the phone girl to tell me what JC Penney was prepared to do to make that right. She told me that they'd removed the charges and notified the credit bureaus. I told her that that was all very well and fine, but where I come from, if a business makes a mistake and causes harm or inconvenience to a customer, the business usually tries to do something to make the customer happy again. And in this case, I was a very unhappy customer contemplating cutting my JC Penney credit card up.

I could literally feel the indifference in her voice as she replied: "Well that's certainly your right and your choice."

I was a bit surprised to say the least. I figured that with my history of spending money at JC Penney, and with Christmas coming, they'd want to try to throw me a bone to get back into my good graces after screwing up my account and making me have to call and sit on hold and then talk to some gum-popping high-school grad on my dime.
"Well what do you want?" she asked, sounding as if the idea of customer satisfaction was a new concept to her.

"Well you could offer a store credit," I suggested. "How about something like that to make up for this?"

"But we removed the charges and we're taking it off your credit report," she said again, with that exasperated tone in her voice telling me that she felt that even that was a courtesy that I should be grateful for.

"You need to do a bit more than that to make this right if you guys want to see me back in your stores. I mean, you're not the only store around and I can easily do my holiday shopping at Sears or any other store in that mall."

"Well that's your right," the little twit repeated, sounding bored.

"So you don't want to do a single thing more than you have to do by law to fix things with a good customer, right?"

"Well I'm not going to do anything, she snapped back. She was actually getting snarky with me now. "If you like, I can give you a number so you can talk to my manager, but I doubt that she'll do anything for you either."

"Ok, fine," I sighed. "Listen to this." I took my desk scissors and cut the JC Penney card in half right next to the phone. "That was your credit card getting cut and it means that you don't get any more business from me."

"OK, that was your right..." she repeated.

"Yes it was," I told her. But it was your attitude and your pathetic excuse for customer service that made me decide to do it. Keep treating customers like this and it won't be long before you drive enough of us away that you're out of business.

"Is there anything else I can do for you," she asked, sounding seriously annoyed now.

"No," I told her. "Anything else I need, I'll get from Sears." Then I hung up.

I chopped the credit card up a few more snips and reflected that it's this sort of attitude expressed by so many American businesses today, either by intent or by negligently entrusting affairs to kids like this one that has brought about the death of consumer loyalty, a record number of customer service complaints and a customer satisfaction rating at an all-time low, and the explosive growth of internet shopping which has significantly cut into the profitability of staffed retail stores. If things keeps going the way that they are now, many retail store chains--and retail jobs--may disappear altogether. And one of the major causes of their demise will be because they forgot how to treat customers. I remember when the customer was always right. Pity for JC Penney that their phone girls don't remember this basic service mantra any longer.