Hey everyone... I'm so dog gone mad I'm spitting fire!! I've had a GEMB Old Navy account since 2002! 8 long years! I've been late maybe 3 times and they always forgave me and took it off my account. It was never reported to credit bureau. Well my credit is in the toilet because of a student loan that defaulted and was sent to collections. It has been being paid since January 2009, never late but still hurts my credit. I also have high debt to income ratio. My problem with GEMB Old Navy is this: I had a CL of $520. I had $255.14 charged on it. At one time I had a CL of 1800, but I called and lowered it to $500 and they upped it to $520. Well on their last "review" of my account they decided to LOWER MY CL TO $260!!! SO now my account shows like this: balance: $255.14 Credit Limit: $260.00 Avail. $ 4.86 This makes it look like I've maxed my card out!! I did no such thing!! How can they lower my CL to UNDER FIVE DOLLARS to the balance owed?! All they're trying to do is hope I forget to pay and then they'll get me on a late fee, over limit fee... OMG how can they get away with this?! I've turned them into the BBB but haven't heard anything. I called them and told them if they didn't put my CL back up by at least $150 I was closing the account and the foreign CSR, that I could barely understand, kept begging me to reconsider. They didn't up my limit so I closed it. I rather it show up closed than MAXED. I'm paying it off w/my next 2 payments... I'm so fired up about this! Please tell me if there's anything I can do!
My recommendation is that one should never get mad about anything. I don't. I've trained myself long ago to ignore anger every time he rears his ugly head. He has no place in my life. I learned to control anger a long time ago when one day I got angry at my wife and I was going knock her on her butt but I knew that I couldn't do that and still claim to love her so I had to control that almost uncontrollable urge to kill or else. I was so angry that I could feel a heart attack coming on so I had to just walk away from the scene. Don't ever think that anger can't kill because it most certainly can. Don't get mad, get even or better. In your case, getting mad caused you to make a bad decision. I think you should never have closed that account but rather pay it down to about a 5 percent level and keep it there. Use the card to buy something small every month or two. Maybe a few gallons of gas, maybe a new pack of underwear, maybe a T-shirt but nothing big. That keeps the account active and in good standing, costs them money for the bookkeeping and mailing expenses and your utilization extremely low. That can help your credit rating whereas closing the account doen't help at all.
I agree with Bill. And just to let the OP know, this is happening to a hell of a lot of people. CARD Act, it's just not complete.
You really shouldn't have closed the account without paying it off first...big mistake. A closed account with a remaining balance doesn't look good on your credit reports at all. This is very common these days, and unfortunately there's not much you can do when a credit issuer decides to reduce your credit limit. They have every right to do that, and they can close your account too if they so desire. I've even had one of my accounts closed in the past year for now apparent reason. The best thing you could have done if you were sick and tired of them, would have been to pay off the balance first and then close the account. Since it's already closed, there's not much you can do now.
