I called back as instructed yesterday. I got a hold of the person that was reviewing my wife’s records. She said management was reviewing it, and would contact me. No idea when though. I will give them the same daily courtesy calls they gave us, until this is resolved.

The lady did for the first time, give us an amount she said the check should have been written for. The amount was for $32 more than we wrote the check. She said this was for additional charges and fees that were on the acocunt. I told her we had charged nothing else. She said correct, not since 2003. So I asked how there could be additional charges. The answer was very confusing. As every other conversation I have had with them has been.

I told her I wanted management to call me because I wanted to get this resolved. I told her thanks for all her help, she has given me more information than anyone else ever has, yet I wanted to speak with someone that can make decisions.

After I hung up, I got to reading the invoice again. I noticed the $32 was the monthly minimum charge. I also, for about the 30th time, read all the fine print under the payoff alert area on the bill. It states in there, reading through all the legal language, and after confusion translating, that the minimum payment must be made first, then the payoff amount.

This is VERY VERY deceptive, and allows them to get most of their capital back for reinvestment, yet allows them to keep stacking charges and fees to the account, especially after someone believes they have paid off, and then starts to dispute the amount. It just buys them more time to keep stacking.

I had an attorney look at the invoice, and pointed to the minimum payment area, and asked them, including the ripoff $15 check over phone fee, what I had to pay to clear my account. They said a total of $966.14, as I had paid. I asked them to re-read the bill, and all the fine print. It took them a few minutes to decipher the legal language, and they said they see why it took us so long to see and figure out.

They agreed, it was very deceptive and poorly written. They said the bill should have been written clearly so a person knows exactly what to pay. They said this appeared to be purposely written this way, as to deceive customers and allow stacking.

I plan on fighting this very hard because of this deceptive practice.

Take your bill to an attorney before you pay it off. Make sure someone can actually read what it says, and can give you a correct payoff amount, because HSBC won’t. Even if you call HSBC, they won’t give you a correct amount. When they told us the $951.14 would pay the account off, they either didn’t know about the minimum monthly payment either, or flat out lied.

At least when you go to a loan shark, they tell you “pay this exact dollar amount by this date, or we’ll break your legs.” HSBC says “pay us what you think you owe, and if it isn’t correct, we’ll bust your credit.”

I’ll keep updating this as the saga unfolds :(