Opinions on Capitol One credit card.....

[GoodOlKevin]

I recently received aCapitol One credit card, and made the mistake of reading reviews on it after the fact....i'm hearing horror stories about it, and i'm a little worried. Anyone have a card and want to give their view on it? Thanks in advance

[guller]

Cancel it if their policies worry you. No sense in using a bad card.

[BradleyT]

What kind of horror stories?

I've had a cap one card for 6+ years without any problems. Many of the horror stories probably come from morons who don't know how to manage their credit.

[LordBP]

I have never had a problem with mine. It was my first CC and I've had it a little over a year now.

[Preem]

Capital One offers different types of cards.

I got the "No Hassle" card that charges zero fees for cash advances. The main reason I got it was so that I could get cash advances at ATMs while traveling.

Most credit cards charge 3% or more for cash advances.

I've used it in Vegas, San Diego, Buenos Aires, and Montreal, and I've never had a problem with it.

[squiffy]

Found some websites detailing complaints against Capital 1.

I have had no negative experiences thus far. But I do have one thing to report. After about one week and 15 purchases/balance transfers, my account was frozen and I was asked to call their fraud dept.

I looked on this as a good thing. If someone were using my account fraudulently, I would want them to catch it quickly. But they seemed much more aggressive than other card companies in this respect.

I am not sure what triggered it. It may have been large transfers. Or it may have been the fact that I called them once from a number that they did not recognize.

I was also told once by a Capital One customer service rep that I had 0% interest on both purchases and balance transfers with no fees for balance transfers. So I made a balance transfer.

But it turned out that the woman had charged me 4.99% for the BT. Which was incredibly strange. Fortunately, the next woman I talked to several days later, by chance, mentioned the 5% charge. And a supervisor waived the fee and gave me a 0% interest on the balance transfer, since my agreement said 0% interest on purchases.

And I did receive two mailings with contradictory information. One said only purchases were 0% interest. The other said that both purchases and BTs were 0% interest.

So I am starting to get worried. But so far, except for these discrepancies, I am not aware of any unfair charges that they have actually tried to impose. When I told them about the error, it was supposedly corrected.

But we shall see.

http://www.consumeraffairs.com/credi...apital_one.htm

[squiffy]

Very scary. If true.

I mean, I did have a customer rep tell me that a balance transfer was 0% interest with no fee, then put through the transfer. And the next day I found out there was a 5% interest charge.

[squiffy]

http://www.epinions.com/content_15218609796

[squiffy]

A lot of the complaints against Capital One, or any credit card company, can perhaps be avoided if you take the following precautions.

1. Check your account daily either online or by phone to make sure you know when your payments are due, what your balance is, and if the Card company has made any errors.

2. Try to make your payments by using free online billpay through your bank account or through Capital One's online service.

Electronic payments are often faster and more secure than snail mail. With regular mail, there is a chance the check will be lost or stolen, or that it will be lost by a Capital One employee.

With the electronic payment, it can typically post within 1-3 days, and you hopefully have some electronic evidence to show when the payment was made and received, what account it was credited to, in what amount, etc.

A lot of the complaint involved people who paid late, were assessed various charges, claim they paid but the payment was not handled properly, etc.

In some cases, the consumers may be lying or misstating the facts. In other cases, the card company employees may have mishandled the account.

But either way, making an electronic payment helps establish the facts of what happened and when.

And if you can monitor your account daily, you are more likely to catch errors quickly. And you can keep on top when your payments are due and have been received.

Since I am doing credit card arbitrage and have about 230K in revolving credit debt, I try to visit each credit card and bank account daily by computer.

I have about 20 credit card accounts with MC, Visa and AmEx, and about 4-5 dept. store credit accounts, two car loans, two mortgages, 6 stock trading accounts, and about 10 different bank checking and savings accounts with some 6 separate banks.

So I keep all the debits and credits on an excel spreadsheet to keep track of them. It's incredibly confusing. But each day I spend a little time updating the accounts.

So there is simply no excuse for a person with only 2-3 credit card accounts to screw up his or her account. To avoid serious problems, it's worth it to spend a few minutes a day checking your account balance etc. And it's worth it to try to make sure you have online access to your account info 24 hours a day.

[GoodOlKevin]

Very informative guys, thanks