Mountain Trader

I found today that I can, at last, access my detailed account information and charges for the past 6 months or so online.

I don't have the new card yet, though over the phone they gave me the new card number. I registered at the BofA site with that card number a few weeks ago, got a new user id and password. Still couldn't get to my info as I needed the card to be activated.

Today I was going to call BofA to send me a card overnight but I checked the website and now I can access my info.

Maybe you can too.

fun888

i do not trust b a. They are not too honest people.
Never got my new card, used the old schwab oversea for the last 2 weeks.
When i came home yesterday, i got the new card.
I am afraid they will ding me for the 3% oversea transaction fee while the schwab card is free.

JEFFJAGUAR

Not to worry....we are now sure there is no foreign transaction fee on the card!

aBroadAbroad

Just though I'd provide a different datapoint for those who are wary of BofA but may not have any recent experiences with them (note, this is specifically Bank of America, not FIA)…

Mind you, I have absolutely no love for BofA myself, but we do find it necessary to have several accounts with them, including a 10-year-old, relatively high limit credit card that is only used about once a year. It’s a former Alaska Airlines card that I converted to a Rewards card about a year ago. I recently charged about $200 to this card just before leaving the country. I get email alerts, and the card's been on full-balance auto-pay for years, so I never gave it another thought.

Fast forward two months: I arrive back in the US to find two paper statements (supposed to be paperless), along with a BofA credit letter informing me that my five-figure LOC was now $500, and my FICO had been slashed... WTH??? I also had received no email alerts during those two months.

So, I go online and see the account is no longer set up for auto-pay or paperless billing or account alerts. This leads to about two weeks of emails involving canned replies that had nothing at all to do with my inquiries, and the final email saying, in so many words, “tough luck, you paid late, if you don’t like it, write a letter to this address”—aargh!

I finally figured out that something must have gone wrong when I deleted the old Alaska card number from online banking right before I left the country. I called the number on the credit letter and—brace yourselves—a real live US-based CSR picked up on the very first ring… WOW!

She said the system showed I had cancelled auto-pay and paperless billing. I told her there’s no way I’d do that, pointed out the BofA payment account that never drops below $5k, and the perfect 10-year payment history on the card. I then explained that I believed the auto-pay error was somehow related to deleting the old card profile from online banking.

She listened politely, did not argue, and asked me to please hold while she contacted online banking. Within a few minutes, she confirmed that all of my account settings had indeed been wiped out by a tech glitch. The whole call took about 15 minutes. Late fees and interest were instantly refunded, my full credit line was restored, and credit agency notifications were sent for removal of the delinquencies (I’ll have to verify that in a few weeks).

It was all handled very professionally and knowledgably, and I did not need to ask for anything once it she had established that the error was theirs, not mine.

In this instance, BofA was definitely responsive, honest and effective. They could easily have insisted that I'd cancelled the auto-pay, as originally appeared to them to be the case, and forced me to spend a lot of time and energy submitting all kinds of documentation supporting my position. But they didn't. Instead, they did some quick research, identified the error, admitted it, and took steps to make everything right.

That said, I’d strongly advise everyone to avoid using online chat and the email service, as both are non-US-based, and have gotten me nothing but frustration in the past. YMMV.


~mrs


p.s., we incurred no forex fees for recent international transactions on our new BofA/ex-FIA/ex-Schwab card...

Happy

This happened to me tonight.

I got the 3rd new number cards on Friday afternoon via FedEx. I tried to activate it online Sunday evening but I failed one or more of the security questions the online system asked - there were at least 4 or 5 screens to ask info as backdated as in 1996! I would not remember the street name / number, or zip codes for places lived 15 years ago, especially it was during the period we were moving around not just within a city, between cities but also between states... Anyway, it instructed me to call to activate it. The CSR answered the phone had no problem activate the card - he even saw I had a credit balance on the card (as a result of BofA moved the phone payment twice) and asked me if I wanted a check. No, I dont want a check but I do want to see my card online. He couldn't figure out which phone number to transfer me to at first, then told me the dept closed 45min ago.

Later I tried to enroll the new card online but I got error message, telling me the information I entered did not match with what was in BofA system..., the error indicator pointed to the cvc and I did not have a typo...

So, the saga continues, at least till Monday morning when I could get hold of online banking rep to figure out why BofA system could not recognize my card, nor link the card profile with the banking profile...

wco81

I've had my card for 2 weeks but yet to activate it yet.

Not sure I need yet another card, though the 5% on gas wouldn't hurt.

My Chase Sapphire Preferred is the card for foreign transactions but I'm not sure I will keep it past the first year.

themicah

The Schwab card has always been serviced by FIA, a wholly owned subsidiary of BoA. The main change here from the status of the last year is primarily branding, and secondarily the awards program.

The new BofA cards have no foreign transaction fee for ex-Schwab customers. By law they have to notify you in advance if they're going to change that.

Montacute

So if someone were to apply for the BofA card as a new customer, there would be foreign transaction fees?

pattermj

Hmm interesting to hear their is no foreign exchange fees, makes me start to potentially reconsider using/keeping the card. Being still in grad school I really don't have the long of a credit history and I had been hoping to turn the schwab card into my long term card, but with the changes I was feeling I would need to potentially rethink that option. I am currently using my CapOne Venture card as it offers the 2% and no fees but it does have an annual fee I am unsure I can get waived. With the addition of the BofA online cash back system I am thinking the rewards card might now be more comparable to the CapOne without the annual fee. What are your guys thoughts?

themicah

Yes. Here is the application for the BofA 3/2/1% rewards card, which clearly discloses a 3% FTF.

But I recently got a copy of the full card agreement for my converted-from-Schwab Bank Americard, and it does not have an FTF of any sort. I'm still waiting for my first statement to close with a foreign transaction to confirm for sure in practice, but all signs point to the 0% FTF having been grandfathered.


You probably won't be able to waive the CapOne fee. It's worth keeping if you consistently charge over $12k per year to the card. Otherwise, you can always switch to the no-annual-fee CapOne Cash Rewards card, which is 1.5% cash back. Meanwhile, there's no need to cancel the BofA card even if you don't actively use it, since keeping the account open will help you build credit.

pattermj

Yea I will probably do that and just ensure to utilize the BofA card for those 5% and cashback special purchases. It does look like the cash rewards card has no foreign exchange fees either but it is a Mastercard, I have actually never had a MC only VISA and Amex, how does it compare to the extra benefits of having the capone venture being a signature card?

Happy

So I called online banking 1-800-933-6262 this morning, per the instruction given by the credit card rep last night, for the issue the card not showing up online, and the system did not recognize the cvc number of the card.

Online banking does not see this card number at all. Basically this card does not exist per the online banking system. He insisted the no show was due to different name - which was not true. In any case he was no help at all and transferred me to the credit card side. Upon there, the rep at credit card side said it was a good card and it was correctly activated. She said she needed to confer with online banking on what was the issue and put me on hold. Well, as it often happened, after several minutes and a few phone clicks, the line was disconnected.

I called again this time to 1-800-887-5749 opt 2 - that number was given to me last week by a helpful rep who had arranged the FedEx delivery of the latest card. This time the rep looked up the latest card number and again confirmed it was a good card. She also confirmed that this card was not showing up with my online user id - though she could see the card under my SSN, security word and address. She said she would initiate a request to online banking for manually linking the card with the online user id for checking account - it would take 48 to 72 hours before the process could be completed. She said by Wed or Thur, I should be able to see the credit card online together with the checking account when I log in... I will believe it when I see it.

Also she said I would need to manually go in to make the BofA checking account to be the bank account for the cash rebate. It would not automatically happen even though they may show up online together.

I am not sure if BofA really want to keep the old Schwab/FIA customers because this process has to be one of the bumpiest ones among all card conversions I have ever experienced!

EDIT:

Just for the Safety Sake, I checked the never received card number that was supposedly closed as "stolen / lost" and replaced by the latest card, the former has remained a "good" number because the phone system does not give me "This account is closed" message! This may have explained WHY the latest card number is not recognized by the system! However when I called again to make sure there was only ONE good card number, I was told it definitely was the case. This leads me to think BofA's data base is NOT updated overnight - there is at least 2 to 3 business days lag time before its data base for both automatic phone system and online system to reflect the changes, such as payment by phone does not reflect in account balance until at least 48 hours later, as well as replacement card / cancelled card information.

Even Citi does a better job than BofA which remains unable to integrate the MBNA/FIA system into its own system after purchasing MBNA many years ago.

CaptainMiles

I received my first statement of the new BofA card with a foreign transaction in it.

As we suspected, this card was grandfathered with NO FOREX FEE. As I previously reported, the transaction had posted at very near the interbank exchange rate. Now, when the statement closed there was no additional fee. 0% forex fee is confirmed. ^

This is now one of the few 0% forex cards from a major bank (other than C1) with no annual fee. Kudos to BofA for keeping this feature of the Schwab card.

wco81

But how long before they change these terms?

CaptainMiles

No point guessing. If and when they do, people will reassess whether to keep or ditch the card.