Citibank disappointing

Citibank disappointing

From Suara Pembaruan

As a Citibank member since 1995 I had trust in the bank's safety and professionalism until recently, when an incident reversed all that.

On Oct. 2, 2003 I got confirmation from Citybank that three mobile phone owners registered on my visa card had added credit to their cellular phone numbers. They had made 17 transactions to add credit using a prepaid card over seven days worth Rp 1.76 million.

I sent a fax the next day to deny any registration of such names and request that my card be blocked and the reload transactions canceled. An investigation led to a decision on Dec. 1, 2003 that all the transactions and interest would be borne by the bank.

However, on Dec. 19, 2003 all the liabilities were again charged to my visa account because according to the bank's investigating team, my personal data had been stolen when I "lost" my bag containing the data and credit card, before the card was blocked and the bag recovered. I denied this argument because I had not lost my bag nor my credit card.

A meeting with Citibank personnel was held on Jan. 9, in which I insisted that all the transactions and interest be annulled because I had never used the reload facilities. The cancellation was then left to the Citibank management to decide.

Through a letter, the bank's management decided on Jan. 28 that as the card holder I remained accountable for the liabilities, considering the verification procedure had already been followed.

On Jan. 30, I was informed that in view of my good track record as a Citibank member, the management decided to share the burden with me equally. To me, the decision was very disappointing because it was a kind of bargaining for Citibank's own negligence. On Feb. 5, the bank again confirmed that the decision was final.

With all the bank's sophisticated technology and professional personnel being promoted, in practice it proves to be lacking.

A client Depok, West Java