Kibo …

In October I decided to cancel my MBNA Mastercard.  Why?  Simple - they send out far too much junk mail, regardless of how often I ask them to stop.

You can’t close an account on-line, so you have to endure the worst automated call system in the world, and you still have to talk to a Customer Service Droid to justify your decision.

Unfortunately I had an outstanding balance of £0.09.  Yup.  Nine pence.  I paid that on-line, then ‘phoned to cancel.  After going through the usual “We have great balance transfer rates” crap I managed to get the account cancelled, with a zero balance.

Now, MBNA has a minimum payment by direct debit.  That’s smart enough to only take what’s outstanding or the minimum, depending on which is the smaller value.  However, it’s not smart enough to know that if a customer settles their account in full, leaving a zero balance, that it shouldn’t attempt the take payment by direct debit.

So, a month after I cancelled, MBNA’s Direct Debit Robot tried to collect the £0.09 I no longer owe.  As I’d already closed the account I’d also cancelled the direct debit mandate, so the payment failed.  Then they hit me with a £12 charge for “Return Payment Default Sum”.

Another ten minutes navigating their shitty automated system and I got the charges cancelled.  After all, I didn’t owe them anything.

In the time I’ve had my MBNA account I’ve tried to get them to stop sending credit card cheques, loan offers (every week), statements (I can get those on-line), and the reasonably frequent marketing call.  They don’t listen.

Save yourself this aggravation and don’t bother signing up for any sort of account with them.  They are truly, truly awful.