Capital One's customer service is terrible on all points and purposes. Its telephone menu is so rigid and robotic that reaching customer service is a trial from the start of the call. The menu isn't accurate or direct either. Capital One has on several occasions simply rejected a charge without notifying me, the customer, and when I call to inquire as to the reason, I receive no straight answer but I do receive promises that it won't happen again -- and then it does happen again several months later. There is one service that is customer-friendly: e-mail notices that payment is due, followed by another email asking, "Was the email you received helpful?" I would rely upon the email noticing payment due and pay promptly -- until the emails stopped and I failed to make prompt payment for the first time in years and was charged $25.00 in late fees. When I inquired why the email notifications suddenly stopped, I was told, "It's because you were late in payment." The reason for not paying promptly was that Capital One did not send an email notice of payment due to me and the reason for not sending such emails in the first place was "late in payment"???? Every now and then Capital One would reject a decent, traditional, regular charge -- for no good reason I could discern even after a long telephone inquiry. Recently, two such traditional charges were rejected -- each time without my being notified of the refusal. The explanation I received this time was "late payment due." To deal with Capital One, nothing it says or does can be relied upon. You have to watch Capital One like a hawk to make sure everthing is as you expect it to be financially. The customer service rep answers from a call center which is loud and noisy, making communication between the institution and the customer very difficult and stressful. The answers the rep provides are robotic and scripted. Lastly, another service Capital One thinks is helpful is their credit alert emails. The alerts come from some robotic algorithm that pretends it's searching "the deep web" to discover your personal info might be compromised -- and then also provides info about your credit score -- none of which I found authentic or helpful. The service is fraudulent in my opinion and seems focused on making me paranoid and afraid that my credit rating, which is very good, is getting lower and more at risk. I'm sick of Capital One's shenanigans. It can take its TV commercials and wipe my butt with them, and I wouldn't have more respect for this conniving institution.
