Roy B. Oser, Esq.

The Eldercountry Lawyer is busy with lawyering and is taking a break from column-writing. Our "guest" Eldercountry Lawyer is the editor, who is a member of the New York Bar and entitled to sign her name as Janice A. Oser, Esq.

It’s a fair guess that you have never have taken the time to read the small print at the back of your credit card billing statement, or the credit card agreement that you were sent when you received the card (or whenever the terms of the agreement were changed). The sort of credit card I’m talking about is a consumer credit card, that is, a card issued to you as a natural person primarily for personal, family, or household purposes. In both of the above-mentioned documents, if they pertain to such a card, you can find some sections that the bank (or credit union, or thrift—I’ll just use the word “bank”) that issued the card was legally obligated to include and that you might have occasion to find of special interest.

These sections, under headings like, “What To Do If There’s an Error in Your Bill,” or “Your Billing Rights,” or “Billing Rights Summary” (look at the bottom of the second column on the back of your statement, or at the end of the agreement) concern some rights you have under the federal Truth in Lending Act and the federal regulation that implements the Act. Although the headings of these sections may suggest to you that these rights pertain merely to errors made by the bank in billing you, they have a broader application that includes goods and services that you purchased with your credit card but that were not received as promised (that is, as “agreed upon”).

If you have been unable to get satisfaction from the seller about these goods or services, you might be able to get your money back anyway, so to speak (that is, a credit on your bill or a cancellation of a charge, if you haven’t paid it), without going to court, if you follow the correct procedures.

Although these procedures are not all that complicated, you will probably want to engage in the process only if you feel that you have a pretty clear case. For example, perhaps a product arrived damaged (a snapshot would be useful) or not at all, or the services, such as painting or installation of a floor covering, were not provided in accordance with the contract (again, snapshots would be useful), or not provided at all. Otherwise, your dispute with the seller may involve questions of quality or of fact that will need to be determined under “state or other law”—that is, in court.

Under the procedures outlined in the federal regulations, you may file a complaint with the issuer of your credit card about goods or services purchased with the card, provided that you are the primary cardholder. (If you are not the primary cardholder, have the primary cardholder file the complaint.) You may withhold the amount charged for these goods or services when you pay the rest of your bill, but unless it is, say, a substantial amount for a purchase that you are sure was not made by you or anyone authorized to use your card, I would advise against withholding payment. If you do, the bank will be permitted to report the amount withheld on your credit record as being “in dispute,” which you may not want.

Your complaint to the bank must be in writing (a telephone call will not preserve your rights) and received by the bank within 60 days of the date on which the charge for the goods or services was first sent to you (check the date of the credit card bill). The rationale for these time constraints is that if the bank resolves the complaint in your favor, it will want to “charge back” the amount to the seller, and the bank has to do that within a certain time. And remember that the bank has to receive your complaint within the 60-day period. Don’t wait for the last minute.

The first thing you will need to do is set up a file with all the documentation you have of the transaction in question, including receipts, contracts, and any related correspondence. If your complaint concerns defective goods, return the product if this is possible and practicable. Send a letter or e-mail to the seller giving your reasons for your dissatisfaction with the goods or services purchased, and add a copy of it to your file.

Assuming that you do not get a satisfactory response from the seller within a reasonable time (which is the premise of this article), the next step is to write a letter to the bank (be sure to date it), within the 60-day period described above, and send it to the address specified for this purpose on the back of your credit card billing statement in the section about your billing rights. The address may be given right there in that billing rights section, or you may be referred to the customer service address on the first page of your credit card bill. Either way, be sure that you do not address your letter to the address given for payment of your bill.

The technical term for your complaint letter is “billing error notice” (although it need not involve a claim that the bank made a mistake in your bill), and in it you need to include the following: your name (that is, the name of the primary account holder) and account number, the dollar amount of the transaction that is the subject of the complaint, the grounds for your dissatisfaction with the goods or services involved, and your signature (that is, the signature of the primary cardholder). And keep a copy for your file.

The bank will be obliged to “investigate” your complaint and assess your claim based on information obtained from you and from the seller, and must at least acknowledge your letter within thirty days, if it has not resolved the complaint before that. The bank must resolve your complaint, one way or the other, within two complete billing cycles after receipt of your complaint, but in no event after more than 90 days. If the bank does not resolve the matter in your favor, it must give you its reasons for denying your claim. The bank may find, for example, that the dispute between you and the seller is such that it requires a determination under state or other law (i.e., by a court) about the quality of the goods or services, or as to whether or not you may be deemed to have “accepted” them.

If you are unsatisfied with the bank’s response, all is not necessarily lost, because you can appeal the bank’s decision, so to speak, by sending a letter, with a copy of your file, to a bank regulatory agency. If the institution that issued the credit card is a national bank (look for the word “national” in its title), you should send your letter and file to the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), at the following address: Customer Assistance Group, 1301 McKinney Street, Suite 3450, Houston, TX 77010.

If the card issuer is not a national bank, you could try calling the OCC, at 1-800-613-6743, or sending an e-mail to Customer.Assistance@occ.treas.gov to see if you can get the name and address that way of the appropriate regulatory agency. Otherwise, send your letter and file to the OCC, and if the OCC is not the appropriate agency to deal with your complaint, it will forward it to the agency that is.

All of the above applies, as indicated, to consumer credit cards, or to the use of the credit card feature of a card that may also have a debit card feature. Protection for holders of consumer debit cards is also available under federal statute and regulation (different statute, different regulation), but this protection pertains for the most part to “errors” in the ordinary sense made, or alleged to have been made, by the bank, or to unauthorized use of the card, but not to goods or services purchased with the debit card and found lacking.