Washington Mutual, I Have A Payment Puzzle For You.

I have a WaMu card. They are the worst! For most of last August I was
out of town with a family issue and forgot to pay my card. When I
arrived home I had over 20 messages from WaMu demanding payment! I had
the card for over 2 years without missing a payment! I'm sorry this
happened to you!

"Apparently, it's being applied to my January statement, because the
cut off for my account is January TWENTY-FOURTH."

"I would have known that HOW?"

Look at the entire CC statement. Somewhere, it says "Statement Date"
or "Closing Date" or gives a range of two dates(example, January 2,
2007, to February 2, 2007). This may be on the portion you send back
in with your payment. It may be someplace on the other part of the
statement. I don't have an account with WAMU, so I can't tell you
where to look or which phrasing to look for. But I did receive 4 CC
statements today, and I looked for this info on all so I could reply
to you.

Whatever the phrasing, WAMU tells you exactly which dates are included
in this statement. If you make ANY payments before the "statement
date" or "closing date", these are included in the January statement.
These dates tend to be fairly consistent for each CC each month.
For example, your WAMU bill is probably due each month on or about the
24th. So your closing date is well before the 24th, so WAMU has the
opportunity to receive and process any payments before sending out
your bill.

READ your statements carefully. You should be able to look through
your files to check the closing dates on your WAMU statements. You
have kept your statements, haven't you?

If you have been good clients in good standing, you may be able to
have the late charge waived this one time. Call, be polite and ask.
Oh, and be POLITE.
The worst that can happen is that WAMU denies your POLITE request and
charges you a late fee. Ask for a supervisor if you don't get the
answer you are looking for, but BE POLITE.

Did I mention that you need to be POLITE???????

Is this the WAMU bank?

I swear, every time I see one of their commercials, I think of SHAMU
the whale and wait for it to do tricks.

I know, I know. Time to up the meds, Tracy...

It really doesn't matter that you'll close this account as 'quickly as
humanly possible...[and]will not be dealing with WAMU visa again.' No
matter which credit card company you choose to deal with, this is the
method used in applying funds they receive.

How do you deal with it to 'get ahead of the game?' Write your check,
deduct it from your checking account balance, but don't mail it in
until you get your statement. If you do online banking, choose a date
for payment after the 23rd of January.

'this was the intention when I made the payment.' Credit card
companies are not mind readers. They have no idea of your
intent--they apply it to the correct account (hopefully)--period.

Good luck in finding a credit card company that will make exceptions
to their terms and adhere to what you think is better. Although,
kudos to you in trying to pay off your debt as quickly as possible.
Too many people don't have that attitude and then wonder why they are
so deeply in debt.

Just a disclaimer, this is NOT me.

Angela

(At least I know that if you want a payment to be applied to a certain
billing, you can't just assume it'll happen that way -- you need to
speak with someone or write a note on the check or billing statement.)

I know that everyone is providing explanations as to WHY this happened
and I'm sure they'r all correct, but I'd STILL be pissed if it
happened. And I think considering this is the first time, she didn't
realize, and HELLO, she was being a GOOD customer, they should fix it
and credit it to next month. I mean, seriously, they're penalizing her
to paying EARLY? This isn't someone who didn't pay or paid late. They
are being ridiculous if they can't/won't go in and credit this for the
proper month.

"I would have known that HOW?"

I'm glad you asked Angela. The way you know this is by reading the
"Terms and Conditions" which you would have been given when you signed
up for this account.

More important than the late fee you are being charged is the negative
reporting to your credit. If this kind of negative information is
recorded on your credit report, you may have your credit rating drop
by several points. See if you can find the minimum payment amount
from other areas in your budget.

While it is an unfortunate incident, it's basically the way all banks
work. Whatever they receive before the posting date gets applied to
that month's amount, unless as Bill said earlier, there's a note in
the memo area or some previous arrangement made with the bank.

That makes more sense.

Angela,
When you made the payment did you write in the memo section of the
check or attach a letter letting them know of your intention to have
this amount applied to your February balance?
Bill R.

Make another small (minimum) payment for that month now so they do not
charge you that extra fee. Most mortgage companies will do the same
thing to you too so you have to watch that. Difference is, you won't
get a statement showing it, they'll just charge you the interest in
the long run of it and you will still owe the same month's payment.