Legal Question in Consumer Law in North Carolina

Legal for company to debit bank acct 2 yrs later?

On 1/6/2001, I took initital steps to become a customer of an online company that provides bill payment services. I provided bank routing info to them. The next day I told the rep that I would not be completing the process and to ''cancel'' the account. The rep said he would. More than 2 years passed with no contact from this company. Then last month I saw they had debited my account $15.00. The co. states they discovered my account open in their sytem and they are within their rights to debit open accounts for service charges. I protested, citing the conversation with their rep back in 2001 and the fact I didn't hear from them for over 2 years confirmed that the account was indeed closed and someone must have recently re-opened it. They deny this happened, stating my account was open all this time and I wasn't debited due to computer error. They maintain the verbal agreement to close the account doesn't matter since they require customer requests for closing accounts to be in writing (the rep said he would cancel the membership process and we never consumated the ''customer'' relationship). They also say ''you should've been billed this $15.00 back in 2001 anyway, so it's our money''. QUESION: Has this company acted legally?


Asked on 3/15/03, 10:38 am

1 Answer from Attorneys
Jim Griffin The Law Office of James L. Griffin

Re: Legal for company to debit bank acct 2 yrs later?

It depends. You say you told the rep that you would not be completing the process. What process was left to complete? However, the 2 year delay-"computer error" seems fishy. Likely, they figured you would not waste your time to recover your $15 and they would at least get that amount out of you. Did you receive anything from the company stating how you could cancel? An attorney letter could probably settle this but it would cost you more than the $15. i.e. $50 for the letter to recover $15. I would advise you to follow their procedures-cancel and write off the $15. If it's a principal thing, email me back if you would like me to look further into this, but like I say, $50 to recover $15 just "ain't" worth it.

Good luck,

Jim

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Answered on 3/16/03, 12:46 am


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