A B.C. couple says they felt they were getting the run around from PC Financial Mastercard when mysterious charges surfaced on their credit card statement.
“I just felt they weren’t listening to us, “ said Ron Gray.
Gray says back in February he was about to launch a home-based business and signed up to some subscriptions like Bluehost, WordPress and Adobe to help him design his website.
Shortly after, for personal reasons, Gray put the project on hold and says he cancelled all his subscriptions.
However, in April, his wife Janet noticed something unusual on their PC Financial Mastercard statement: a charge in British Pounds from a company called BKHELP.ONLINE.
“It didn’t make any sense because I never ordered anything for $60,” said Janet Gray.
The couple reached out to PC Financial immediately to dispute the charge and say they were told by a representative to deal with the vendor directly and cancel the subscription.
“I said to them I tried phoning the number that was on the credit card statement and it was an offshore number somewhere in Europe and it wouldn’t complete. I dialed it twice and both calls collapsed,” said Gray.
The Abbotsford resident says he kept trying to contact the company, but received no response. He went back to PC Financial for help.
“I was frustrated when they repeated, ‘You have to deal with the merchant.’ I said, ‘I cannot because I have no means of contact with them. The phone doesn’t work and they won’t answer the emails,’” said Gray.
What’s worse, the Grays say they continued to get charged C$60 for several months.
At the end of August, Ron says despite their case being escalated to a PC Financial supervisor, they received the unexpected news their case was closed.
“That lit my fuse. They closed the case without telling me,” said Gray.
The Grays turned to Consumer Matters for help.
After Global News reached out, the Grays received a full refund of over $500 and $175 in PC points.
“I’m grateful you were there. Nothing else would have moved it. Nothing else would have broken the log jam,” said Ron Gray.
In a statement, PC Financial told Consumer Matters that it has robust protocols in place for investigating and resolving fraudulent charges.
“However, in this case, the charges were not initially reported as fraudulent and were consistent with subscription purchases the Grays claimed to have previously made,” said the statement.
“As soon as the charges were reported as fraudulent, our agents immediately contacted the merchant and were able to cancel the subscription and secure a credit to the Grays’ account.”
After their experience, the Grays are now warning consumers to get in the habit of checking their monthly credit card statements for any suspicious charges.
“Credit card companies make big money with their interest and the fact that those of us that are paying they don’t seem to care about us as long as they get their money, they’re happy,” said Janet Gray.
Comments