I don’t know how it happened since I have my bills sent directly to my bank, but somehow I let a payment to Citibank slip. And man, did they let me know it. I kept getting calls to my cell phone from a random number (816-420-1002). Since it was random, I don’t pick up and they wouldn’t leave a message. So I do what I normally do when I get “a random” – I googled it.

Turns out – this was a popular number. It was Citibank calling to collect PAST DUE money!
WHAT?! I couldn’t believe it – so I raced to Citibank’s website to look at my account. My monthly payment has skyrocketed and my APR went from 0% to 34.99%!

I immediately issued a payment to remove the entire balance (transferred to the card linked to my checking – so it would be fast).

I then went to check out Citibank’s stance on universal default…luckily they opted out of the universal default practice before this happened, but still. 34.99%?! Really?

All I keep thinking about is the line I read in the story I linked to before that said, “Citi said the changes were part of its ongoing efforts to “put our customers first.”‘

Again…34.99%?!

Oh well – I guess at the end of the day it’s clearly my fault, but luckily I had the flexibility to do something about it right away. I’m sure there are many people that would be in much worse shape had they been completely maxed out and had this happen to them. I don’t even know how you would begin to dig out of an APR that big in combination to other debt.

Oh well…lesson learned…onward.