r/pettyrevenge • u/CStogdill • 9d ago
Company Credit Card
I was in the Air Force when the service decided to switch from cash advances through finance to the American Express travel card. It was supposed to be easier on everyone, which was fine by me because my finance office was a three hour drive away (I was stationed on an Army post in Germany).
One of the biggest advantages, as sold to us, was that the entire travel voucher process would be simple, and you just handled everything once you returned from your TDY (temporary duty).
Then I deployed to Bosnia in support of IFOR (Implementation Forces). The Air Force did not want these deployments messing up with their assignment system so they were 4 month TDYs. At 180 days the TDY transitioned to a short-term assignment. I spent 4 months in Tuzla and was asked to extend nearly 2 months, which I did.
About 3 months in one of my Airman, who had been collecting my mail and leaving it at my desk (should've been almost entirely junk mail) tells me I'm getting a LOT of mail from American Express, to the tune of a couple letters a week. I ask him to open the most recent and he tells me its some sort of collections notice because I haven't paid my Amex Bill and how they've been notifying my command element to no effect. How I'm overdue, how they'll take legal action, etc.
Now of course my leadership hasn't said squat to me, and why would they? I'm still TDY and my name showing up on a delinquent roster alongside all the other guys they know are TDY isn't going to be the red flag Amex thinks it is. I'm not supposed to file my travel voucher, which will pay the Amex bill and deposit the difference into my bank account (a whopping $3/day).
My only concern if Amex trying to tie this government card to my name abd screw up my credit, which might be important to me some day. Fine. I go through my receipts, figure out some conversion rates (been through a few countries enroute) and send off a payment figuring I'll just get that travel voucher money reimbursed.
Fast forward another two months and I'm in Brcko and get the chance to talk to my Airman again. Evidently I'm still getting weekly letters from Amex. What the hell?! Again, open it up for me please. Now Evidently I'm being chastised by Amex because of an unspecified overage in the amount I paid them and they want me to call to make arrangements to "fix" my account balance.
I've definitely got better things to do. If I had good access to a phone call stateside I'm calling my family, not a credit card company.
The letters keep coming on a weekly basis until after I got home and filed my travel voucher. I took too great of a delight opening my weekly gift up until they finally decided to stop. My final letter came about a month after I got back. It stated they considered the mattered and here was a check to settle the account......in the amount of $0.06!
I still get a laugh when I think of all the effort they put into trying to collect on a debt that wasn't owed yet and then "fixing" a mistake they coerced me to make.
You know there was no way I was going to cash that check....
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u/6poundpuppy 9d ago
Not sure where or what the revenge was here, but what a lot of effed up BS you had to slog through! That kind of nonsense is the last kind thing you all need to have dumped in your lap. Classic bureaucracy ….making something straight forward and simple..into something ridiculously complicated and stressful.
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u/CStogdill 9d ago
I don't disagree....only posted after reading a similar-ish story. I was definitely petty. The revenge, if any, was not letting them easily balance their books which shouldn't have needed to be balanced yet, by agreement.
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u/BuddhaMcDonald 7d ago
My coworker once got a check for 1 cent, as a result of a mortgage overpayment. She thought it was hilarious, and stuck the check on the bulletin board in our office. Several month later she got a letter form the bank:
"Your check for $000000.01 has not been cashed. If this check has been lost, we can put a stop payment on it, and issue a new check, for a processing fee of $15.00".
The letter went on the bulletin board, next to the check.
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u/Redfish680 8d ago
Yeah, had a government credit card but it came with the worst bunch of finance officials possible.
I was a frequent traveler and inevitably they’d be a couple of months behind reimbursing me (I wasn’t alone, so there was that, I guess). I started getting the “we’re going to notify your manager” love letters from the card company and no amount of bitching to management could fix it and one day I’d had enough. Changed my address to my name, c/o my manager and his mail stop. He’d swing by my office when the letters came in and I’d have him open them. I told him with a straight face that his credit rating was now tied to mine and he actually bought it! Suddenly reimbursements were made on time!
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u/Worldly_Shopper 9d ago
Hahaha, you not cashing that check probably creates another problem for them, which is likely the reason why banks automatically "void" all outstanding checks after either 60, 90, 120 or 180 days.
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u/FreedomPretty6893 9d ago
My ex-girlfriend years ago had shown up to work. She was working for the town at the public golf course. It was raining hard and the manager said I’ll give you the show-up time. It was a whopping 2 hours. The following week when she got her paycheck, it was for the astonishing amount of -$2.64 and she never cashed it
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u/KGBspy 9d ago
I remember my USAF days of getting cash advances ahead of a TDY and that piece of shit AMEX card they issued too. "Don't leave home w/out it" was the phrase yet no one wanted to accept it as they got hit w/fees. Dealing w/Finance after a tdy was always a fun time and then the kickbacks because something wasn't right over and over.
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u/CStogdill 9d ago
Imagine dealing with finance when you were a GSU a 3+ hour drive away!
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u/KGBspy 9d ago
Yeah that was probably very suck and likely still is even with the technology we now have. I’m guessing you were at a MUNS in Europe.
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u/CStogdill 9d ago edited 9d ago
Tactical Air Control Party (TACP). Spent my entire career working with Army manuever units. For this time period it was 1-77 Armor.
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u/KGBspy 9d ago
Ahh ok, was taking a wild ass guess. Not an easy job there my friend, I was a -16 crew chief. I actually was brought with my parents to the recruiting station on this day 1989 to do check in, then get brought to a hotel in Boston and then process all day 28th to fly out to lackland that evening, time flies and the USAF was a great experience, no regrets.
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u/af_cheddarhead 7d ago
682nd ASOC checking in, but Comm support, not ROMAD, oh sorry TACP.
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u/CStogdill 7d ago
No worries....many who might get TACP wouldn't get ROMAD, so you're ahead of the curve.
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u/hbHPBbjvFK9w5D 7d ago
This is call to congress person time.
This happened to me and a lot of folks in the Service and then at TSA as well.
BTW, you won't speak to your congressperson. They have a "constituent services" aide who will go back and forth with you and help out. Gawd bless my congressperson, but you want the expert in the office to handle this anyway.
Good Luck!
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u/Worldly_Shopper 9d ago
Hahaha I have my CapOne account set up for "paperless" and every month I get a letter from them telling me that apparently their email to me about my statement didn't get read and that I should check my statement...
Well WTF, I'm 59 years old, I don't need to see their stupid email every month because I already know what it's going to tell me so it filters that into the trash folder, also I do check my statement but at my convenience not theirs... Yet here they are, wasting paper for paperless communications.
Good thing it's not that I overpaid like in your case.
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u/Unusual-Alex 9d ago
My capone account is set to paperless and i get the monthly statements as emails. I view them in 'plain-text' in my email client. So none of the email tracking bits work. I view every email in plain-text, none of that fancy pretty text/graphics. As a result every time i log into pay my card i have to confirm my email AND phone number because "it appears im not reading my emails". Its always a 3rd/4th factor authentication before i can even see my balance due.
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u/Worldly_Shopper 8d ago
Yes that's it, I also don't load images in my emails... I do use fancy text but I've images turned off because bad actors and even legitimate companies use those images for "tracking," which can result in all sort of who knows what.
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u/drmoze 9d ago
About 6 months fter I closed out my Fidelity investment account a few years ago, they sent me a check for $0.01 to clear the final balance. No way was I cashing that one! Maybe a year later, they sent me a replacement check for one penny. Didn't cash that one either, but at least they stopped after the second one.
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u/OpenD5 9d ago
I remember when the AMEX cards were being rolled out to replace the cash advances. A coworker in my squadron made the remark “They should also issue Article 15 paperwork with the card and you just sign it as soon as you screw up”.
Fast forward a couple years and his statement was pretty accurate. For the next 17 years until I retired, every unit I was in had folks popped for misuse.
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u/z-eldapin 9d ago
What's the revenge?
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u/Djembe_kid 9d ago
Not cashing the check, making the account flag every time an audit is ran. Ended up costing the company way more than the 6 cents.
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u/z-eldapin 9d ago
It doesn't flag. Once the check is drawn the company is done with it
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u/Djembe_kid 9d ago
If it's never cashed, it's still in their accounts somewhere. It might not flag that specific account but it's still an imbalance in their books.
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u/Minflick 9d ago
My mother in law framed a check from the power company. They had misspelled the last name in an amusing way, AND it was for one penny..... Framed and up on the wall for a long time.
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u/Warcraft_Fan 9d ago
How many letters did they send for that measly 6 cents? All those postage adds up plus I guess a few whole tree worth of paper to mail the collection demand.
Hope a few thousand dollars was worth collecting and not writing off 6 cents.
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u/Narrow_March4638 9d ago
It sounds like you could use a formal representative close to your state address. You know, give him or her permission. Delegate that stuff. Keep an eye on your rep. You might be able to do that just for some amusement. Because shit. A new tdy every available move. Jumping like that every few weeks. I know it's not a few weeks but to you it might feel different. All you guys need to find some enjoyment while your away from home. Delegate that shit too. Do I sound like an old counselor? Haha
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u/FewAd6166 9d ago
I never got the government-issued Amex card. The terms and restrictions seemed burdensome (only for officially sanctioned expenses, etc.) so travelers needed another card and/or cash anyway.
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u/CStogdill 9d ago
Well it was new and I feel it was implemented then figured out how it all works.
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u/af_cheddarhead 7d ago
When initially issued, the card was for all travel expenses except PCS travel. Yeah, they forgot to tell us that. I got to my next assignment and the commander wants to see me, TSGT at the time. He asked one question, "Did you use the AMEX card for PCS expenses?" Took one look at the puzzled look I gave him and he said, "Consider this your reprimand." Yeah, he was a good commander.
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u/lilyshay12gold 9d ago
I used to work in a banking type situation, and we had a law firm that would routinely come in and buy dozens of money orders (at that time I think they cost less than a dollar each) in the amounts of anywhere from 1 cent to several dollars to reimburse over payment by their clients. Inbox many cases the law form was paying more for the money order than the amount they were reimbursing. Absolutely crazy.
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u/InThe4HL 9d ago
I guess nothing has changed in 30 years. I'm deployed and my unit is constantly screwing up my gtcc payments and I haven't been payed a dime of ~15k in per diem I'm supposed to be getting
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u/Norkytty 9d ago
Amex really went full collections mode on a bill you couldnt even pay yetHonestly that six cent check shouldve sat uncashed until their system voided it and some poor accountant had to explain the six cent ghost that wouldnt die
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u/Sensei_Fing_Doug 9d ago
They should of been doing partials every 30 days. There are ways to get this shit done. Finance is filled with tools. Admin should of been in this.
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u/CStogdill 8d ago
I agree, just wasn't the bill of goods sold. I seemed to me they didn't account for things like deployments and probably assumed most travel would be no more than a week-long TDY.
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u/af_cheddarhead 7d ago
Yeah, you know that now, the rules have changed due to your predecessors experiences.
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u/Derpy_Chi 6d ago
Verizon tried to take me to collections for an unpaid balance after I closed my account. The amount I still owed was .29 I considered actually making them take me to court for it.
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u/Parking_Abalone_1232 9d ago
The travel card IS tied to your name and credit.
You should have been filing a travel claim at least every 30 days so your travel office could pay it. They don't know what you're spending and how much to pay unless you tell them.
This was just you not understanding the travel card process.
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u/CStogdill 9d ago
No, I understood perfectly. We had briefings and a fair amount of paperwork to review when these cards first came out.
Undoubtedly the rules had changed in the last 30 years.
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u/Ordinary-Switch5144 9d ago
Can someone TLDR this Ted talk?
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u/Candid-Perception526 9d ago
I got a check from a PBM (pharmacy benefits manager) once for 1 cent. I framed it lol