I've had a recent situation where I am questioning the legality of the actions taken by my credit card company. I have a credit card with Advanta that had a $500 balance that I've had for a while. I opened a new credit card account with BofA and requested a balance transfer of $1,000 from the Advanta card to the BofA card. BofA sent a $1,000 payment to Advanta. This resulted in a $500 credit balance on the Advanta card. They payment from BofA to Advanta showed up as a payment on my Advanta account, just as if I had sent in the $1,000 payment myself. I called Advanta on the phone and requested that the $500 credit balance be refunded to me. The rep okayed the refund and said I'd be receiving it soon. I then got an email from Advanta a few days later stating suspicious activity on the account. I gave them a call, and they wanted to know about the large credit balance and why it was on the account. When I told them it was because of a balance transfer to another card account, they asked me who the issuer of the other card was. They told me that they would not be able to send the credit balance refund to me. They said that they would have to send the credit balance refund to BofA instead. Is this legal? It seems to me that since the funds were sent to Advanta as a payment, that they have no right to send the credit balance refund to any other entity other than to me. BofA has nothing to do with the relationship between Advanta and myself. If I have a credit balance on my Advanta account, how can Advanta just decide to send the refund to another entity? Thanks for any comments and input! John
I don't mean to sound skeptical, but it sounds like you were trying to get a fee-free cash advance. I can imagine how this might look suspicious to a credit card company who could be left holding the bag if, in fact, it was a fraudulent action. I don't know if it is or it isn't, I'm just saying that if the bank on which the balance transfer check was drawn decides that it is breaking the rules, Advanta might get stuck with the result. As such, Advanta is trying to play it safe. It's possible that this might be a technique used by people who steal credit cards or account numbers (I don't know if it is or not, I'm just speculating). If it was, that would explain how the red flags went up over there. I understand what you're saying and it seems reasonable on the surface, but it could be there was some fine print you overlooked.
I agree w/CCBob; I don't think you can "BT" more than the balance on a credit card, for the obvious reasons ccbob stated. I would have to re-read the fine print, but usually the max you can "BT" over is the balance at time of transfer.
That's why I like the ones that you can get the check payable to you. Then you can pay the $500 on the cc and pocket the other $500.
