7/27/2008

Extortion on the rise!

Yes, and it seems legal, technically. I am sure many of you have received unsolicited credit cards and given lines of credit. When the cards plus all the terms arrived, you will find that you will have to pay an annual fee. Sometimes they called, and I politely told them that all my credit cards are free. If they are giving them free to me, I will keep them. If not they can cancel the cards and facilities. Now this practice is getting more arrogant. They just send the package to you, And they bill you if you did not call them to reject them. The onus is now upon the recipients to call and act on something he does not ask for. Now he has to take the trouble to make those nonsensical calls to a phone machine and to wait for several minutes, pressing stupid numbers to get through. And you don't normally get through on the first attempt but after several attempts. I just received another card, with lines of credit, with cheque books, and of course with an annual fee. I conveniently threw everything into the rubbish chute. I am waiting for the bank to call me for payment of annual fees. You can expect what I am going to show them. Is there any law that I can go to for redress against such extortionist acts? The banks may even use their legal muscle to threaten small people like us for not paying. What is this country turning into? Oh, and I remember sometimes back a big shot banker was complaining about unethical practices in the industry. Is this unethical practice?

4 comments:

Mockingbird said...

i get bugged by all these telemarketers promoting credit cards to me every so often. At least one call per week on average. i just tell them, i don't qualify. Most of the time i just let them yak yak yak all they want and then hang up on them :p

It's a dirty job being a telemarketer. With call recipients like me, more of them would want to quit.

i bet i'm much nicer than those who curse and swear at the telemarketers and demand to know how the bank got their particulars, etc.

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

telemarketing is a tough job and we can be kind to them. but a nuisance is a nuisance.

sending credit cards, credit lines, cheque books are not telemarketing but also a nuisance. and they are charging the innocent recipients for it too.

Anonymous said...

Simple, just send them a bill for 10x the amount they are charging you. You can list it as "Trash Processing Charge".

So if they sue you for not paying, you can counter-sue them for not paying too, since both are unsolicited services.

Don't get mad, get even.

Chua Chin Leng aka redbean said...

hi chew,

welcome to the blog.

i think i will just do that, for the junk mails and the nuisance they caused, collecting the mails, opening them and throwing them away. it takes time and effort.