Out of The Morning Call comes the story, Debt management firm mismanages debt, in which United Financial Systems of Margate, Florida is thrown under the bus for collecting money from a consumer and not sending it to her creditor. Oops!
Greene said United Financial Systems withdrew money from her account as scheduled, but failed to make three payments to Chase on time. It missed the March payment but made it later that month. It also missed payments in May and June.
That resulted in several collections calls a day from Chase.
“They were supposed to be there to help me, not to ruin me,” Greene said.
The lack of payments got her booted out of a special program Chase offers to customers enrolled in a debt management plan. While in the program, she had been offered a 6 percent interest rate and no late fees, down from a rate of 26.99 percent.
In June, Chase told her late fees would resume and her interest rate would be “adjusted” according to the card terms — which could have meant a jump to 29.99 percent — though it never raised the rate.
She said she told Chase the overdue payments were not her fault. She said the bank didn’t want to hear it.
I Was Surprised
I was surprised to see some claims on the United Financial Systems site from the old credit counseling days. Claims that I thought most companies had stopped making.
They are an IRS Nonprofit Company
Many of the groups I check on that claim to be not-for-profit are not legitimate IRS approved companies, United Financial Services is. Here is their 2009 public return to prove it.
Consumer Problems
The mark of a good company is not if a problem is going to occur, it is how they handle it when it does happen. There is no reason why a consumer should not have their payment transmitted to the creditor on a timely basis.
I’ll contact the company and ask them to post a comment so we can hear their side of the story.
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