Ive just spent an hour on the phone with Egg getting the runaround following an email they sent this morning, telling me my interest rate was going to go up - by about 33% in my case. I happened to be at my computer when this email arrived so responded straight away, but customer services did admit that while they hadnt had a huge volume of calls about the changes today they did expect it to get busier later in the day. A quote from their mail says " At Egg we want to treat customers as individuals both in our approach to service and the products we offer. In line with this, we are now personalising the interest rate on your Egg Card. We have taken into account how you run your Egg Card and your relationship with us. This means for some customers, including you, the interest rate on your card will increase. In addition, there is a change to the cash handling fee which applies to all customers. "
My interest rate has changed from a never spectacularly competitive
15.9% to a whopping 21.9%, and they've given exactly eight DAYS notice of such a change. The general help line was unable to give any explanation of what particular circumstance, or pattern of use, had given rise to this change and said it merely reflected their policy of tailoring rates to circumstances. The usual runaround says that customer complaints can only be contacted by post but after getting a bit stroppy they did finally give me a number for them, and they said nothing except that they would register a complaint on my behalf and will write to me in a few days to let me know what they had done in respect of that complaint.Obviously Im going to leave, right now, and I told them that. But what I want to know is about this condition buried in their page upon page of small print that allows them to take an existing customer who signed up with them at a particular rate and then simply change it to a much higher one, for no reason that they are prepared to state. Do standard credit card agreements do that - simply allow rate changes as and when they feel like, giving the customer only one recourse (of closing the account)? And when Egg write an email like that, do they really *not* expect to be deluged with complaints and closed accounts? Im not over my limit (never have been) but do owe them a fair bit which I pay off irregularly so they obviously make more than a few quid out of me to counter those who pay in full each month!