I got THE LETTER, too.. Interestingly, it was dated 12/02, and yet I got another order that was shipped out 12/03 (received 12/06). Oh, well - it was good while it lasted (for me that's 2,000 miles plus 240 phone card minutes).

I'm not surprised the letter is so unprofessional and unbusinesslike (unless you take "businesslike" to mean brusque to the point of rudeness). After all, their web-site promised to contact us if our order was turned down for any reason...and with all the unfilled orders (including some of mine) due to exceeding the (unpublicized) weekly limit, did they ever contact any of us?

By the way, Chase has to have lost money big-time on this. Sure they are (in some cases, but not in my orders) both the merchant and the cardholder's bank, but that just means they get to keep (i.e., not pay themselves) the portion of the transaction fee that would go to the cardholder's bank. They still have to pay the portion that VISA (or whomever) would retain. Then there's the waived delivery fee (which I'm sure UPS did not waive!) and the Ameritech phone card (cheap, but surely not free). Granted, they probably got the checks free from American Express (no commission), but I'd lay odds that AmEx is the one that makes money on the "float" and/or lost/uncashed checks (which is why they were willing to provide them free to Chase).

As for what triggers THE LETTER, AmEx would get the report of which checks were cashed & when; I can't believe Chase would have heard back so soon (or would care). Besides, the fact that people have received the letter without even cashing any checks shows that Chase is looking at order patterns, not check cashing patterns.

What was in this for Chase? Hoping that we'd order some currency at the same time (fat chance, given their ridiculous rates). After all, if not for the miles (which I'll bet Chase didn't even think of), how many of us would have ordered US$ checks unless we were traveling somewhere...in which case most buyers would order some currency "for the convenience."

[This message has been edited by johna (edited 12-13-1999).]