geekyjeff

Just checked in online for my AA flight and got Group 2 boarding. Not a big deal, but was curious. Anyone with a Barclays Aviator Red (but no Citi AAdvantage or AA status) have success in actually seeing the new Group 1 boarding benefits apply to AA ticketed flights? I thought that all the benefits of the Aviator cards were live, but doesn't appear that way for me :/

TReckoner

On my first flight after the ffp merge, while I still had the us card, I got group 3 at the airport checkin and just asked the FA about my group 1 boarding and amended it. on the way back with ticketing I got group 1 automatically.

Something that might be necessary is to remove and add you ff# from the reservation which an aadvantage csr advised me would be probably needed to update the status of flights I booked in the past when I had no status after I qualify for gold.

bucketlist

For any interest it may be, here's another data point on this card and attempts to upgrade to silver.

Received my Aviator card yesterday.

Called today, to activate and ask about going silver.

First rep said - I'll have to transfer you to new card applications.

New card folks (terrible connection - hard to follow agent) said she couldn't accept an app. for silver because i have a red card, and she would transfer me back to Barclay customer service. (The real reason is likely that Barclay can't issue new cards...)

Waited a bit on terrible line - hung up - called Barclay card cust service again. Some of the dialogue is worth quoting:

"Doug" (on a clear line) said I'd "have to wait until conversion is complete and then in July could change to silver".

bucketlist to Doug:

"Please confirm that it's "could" and not "might" be able to convert to silver."

Doug:

"That's right"

COMMENT:

This seems to be a different result than others have reported - some are upgraded right away, some found not worthy due to not enuf spending, and I'm on hold until July...

TReckoner

Who was upgraded right away? The initial offer in 2014 was a different thing,
but beyond that I haven't read about anyone getting upgraded after the FFP merge.

FlightNurse

I wouldn't consider this a "data point" yet, why not call them again and see what the next agent has to say. I guess I should be getting my new card any day.

beershack

I spent > $125K on my card last year and still wasn't offered a silver card. Got the same runaround about waiting until June. Agent said there was nothing he could do now and pleaded with me to wait it out.

Carl

Pardon me while I scream for a moment (OK, several). If you don't want to read about my ongoing infuriating experience with this bank and product, please skip all of this. I've reached a boiling point.

I got this card last fall. We started off on a somewhat bad foot. I received a generic letter in the mail telling me my application could not be processed and that I would need to call a toll-free number for more information. This was several weeks after I'd applied. I called and eventually learned that the issue was that my mailing address is a PO Box, and their system somehow can't handle that. As soon as I provided my street address, they said I was approved and the card was on the way. I admit I was already concerned; if they required my street address, why didn't they ask for it up front? Or call me? Or email? Or something besides sending this out much later. They didn't even need to mail the card to the home address; in fact, they were perfectly content mailing it to the PO Box. I was particularly annoyed because I'd just booked an award flight and would've received the 5k discount if I'd had the card, which I totally should've had if they'd handled this more professionally and quickly. Anyway, I did get that cleared up later, and US was kind enough to credit me the 5k miles. Yay.

When I decided to take advantage of the 0% APR balance transfer offered when you first get the card, I couldn't do it online. I failed the test which asked me multiple-choice identifying questions: in which counties I have or have not owned property, in what state was my SSN issued, etc. It included questions that weren't mine, like the model year of my Buick (which I've never had). I called and had to go through the same thing again. They insisted that there were no trick questions and all of that data did indeed relate to me, so I was supposed to have a Buick (etc.). They wouldn't tell me who provided the data. The only way to get around the questions that didn't apply was to keep asking ones that I could answer until they were satisfied I was really me. Oy vey. Fine, minor hitch, and I wouldn't ever be doing a balance transfer again anyway, so they assured me I'd never need to go through this weird identify verification again.

Just so this won't sound like I have nothing but hate for the company, I AM grateful for the card. Without it and the 10k PQMs, I would not now be PLT (US Gold). My first flight with US (ever) was last May, so I had some status catching up to do. So, that's a major plus that worked as expected. Another nice surprise is that I ended up getting an additional 10k bonus miles (total of 50k) for joining. When I signed up, and for at least a month after that, the advertised promo was the original 40k. So, accident or not, I was happy to see 50k on my statement. That's mostly the end of the good news.

The very first day I used the card, I had to call for authorization when making a purchase at Best Buy (the same store that's within walking distance of my house). OK, fine, I'd made several purchases already, so they were just being extra cautious. It was mildly irritating as I was in a hurry and the store was closing. I verified the other purchases and numerous personal questions and the charge went through. Although that was excusable that one time, it is absolutely not after that. Lately, I feel like I am on the phone with them more than once a day about a charge declined "for your protection." They want to protect me EVERY single time I make a purchase at numerous national retailers. Although I did not have the card when Target and The Home Depot had their data breaches, I am treated as if I did. With a couple of small exceptions, every single charge is flagged at these same stores within walking distance of home.

With Chase (and other cards), all one must do if a fraud alert is trigged is respond to a text alert with one word. The alert appears the very instant the charge is denied at the register, and the flag is cleared in half a second. The cashier just hits a key and authorizes the card again. With Barclay, the text alert doesn't usually arrive for several minutes. When it does (always after I'm already on hold with Account Protection Services), the message says to call a designated phone number and provide the reference number. The phone number provided doesn't actually go to APS (it goes to regular customer care in some other country), and there is never an option to enter the reference number. Although Barclay claims they do have the technology to allow users to reply to a message to approve the transaction, apparently my purchases at the exact same merchants every week are so controversial that they always require manual review (aka the dreaded phone call). And to make matters worse, every single time I approve a charge at Target (and then receive the text message thanking me for verifying my identity), Barclay rejects it when we run it through again. I've learned to stay on the phone every time. They always find some seemingly made-up reason why it failed the first time (and it usually involves blaming someone else).

I now have what I refer to as Barclay PTSD (BPTSD). It has become so much the norm for my purchases to get declined that I get as nervous swiping the card as someone with no money in the bank who fears a check may have bounced. Except in my case, I'm paying my bill in full long before it's due every month. I may not have been a Barclay customer for years, but we at least have more than half a year together. It's easy to look at my shopping history and patterns over that period and see that I'm going to spend $x at particular stores every month. What's disturbing is that they don't seem to care about Internet purchases at all. I've never once had an online purchase halted. If you were in charge of security, wouldn't you be watching those more closely? For whatever reason, they're of the school that B&M stores offer nothing but fraud. I had a charge of <$1 at a fast food restaurant (yes, also within walking distance of my house) questioned earlier this month. Really. Why would I charge something under a dollar, they demanded? Because I paid with a gift card and that was the balance that remained. Well, they said, people just don't do that. It's HIGHLY suspicious and as a result, said the APS gestapo, they would now be monitoring my account even more closely! Yes, that's the way to provide good service!!!

In yesterday's BPTSD, I had one small charge go through at Target (I needed three small items on a separate receipt because I was being reimbursed), and then the second one was declined. Argh! I was so angry, I just told the cashier to forget it and I left. Thing is, calling APS isn't a quick process. There's no way to do it in the line since you may be on hold just for 10 mins. The APS people are actually in the US, which means there aren't many of them. When I got to the car, I got the text message and figured I may as well call since the card would be blocked for everything else otherwise. This person was actually quite friendly (unlike some of the APS folks who seem to have a decline quota to fulfill) and she asked if I could go back into the store again. Amazingly, there was no one in the line where I'd been before, so I went ahead. And...declined. Of course, because that's how it always works when they tell me to go again. I had to exit that line yet again while she probed further into the matter. OH! Here's the problem, she said.

Are you ready for this?! The reason I've had so many declines, she claimed, is because I had not activated my US Airways DM MasterCard after the card servicing had changed to Aviator. I haven't received an Aviator, so there is nothing to activate. AU CONTRAIRE! I am supposed to activate the card I already have, the one that's going away, because they're on a new system now. Say what?! She proceeded to walk me through "activating" the card I'd been using for all these months. That would take care of all of my problems, she said. How did I not know we were supposed to "activate" the cards we already have? After all, they displayed an image of the Aviator Red in my online account, telling me to activate it when it arrived. That was also somehow supposed to tell me I needed to click it and activate my CURRENT card. Are you following this nonsense?

This rep (in Henderson, NV) told me that I would still need to activate my Aviator Red when it arrived in May. Up to that point I was still expecting the card to arrive this month, especially since I'd been told it was mailed Apr 1 (obviously not true). OK, fine, May it is. This was yesterday. So, guess what arrived this morning? The new card. Woohoo! I was only excited because I thought I liked the look of it better. Once in hand, I decided it didn't really matter, but...onwards.

So, here's the thing. The new card does have the same number as before, but it has a new expiration date and CVV2. My prior expiration was in 2017, when I understood these cards would be going away (or perhaps get acquired by Citi?), so I certainly wasn't expecting a new date several years after that. And a new CVV2? Why? What's the point of keeping the card number the same if you have to provide all new info to your current billers? And yes, the mailer made it abundantly clear that you must immediately contact everyone to give them the new card info, as the US card info will no longer work very shortly. What a nuisance! Why couldn't they just leave things alone? Good grief.

After activating this card (just a day after allegedly activating my old one in the "new" system), I went to update the info in Apple Pay. For those that don't have this technology, it's designed to be quick, easy, and automated...for every other card issuer. But for Barclay, once you've scanned the card, you must CALL them to complete setup like you would've done in 1987. So I did, where I was naturally connected to someone who barely spoke English. I needed to provide verification info. Somehow this was more involved than the first time I established Apple Pay. He needed to ask me a series of questions. And then...there they were: those annoying questions that don't relate to me. What color is the Buick I've never had? WTH? I failed again and had to go to APS. That required a 15 minute hold. Again, more punishment for doing nothing wrong. I had to go around the world with this guy since I was once again apparently a security risk, having forgotten that Buick (and also having correctly identified the model year of my former BMW, which apparently is also wrong in this mysterious database). Finally, half an hour later, Apple Pay was once again setup. I'd lost all of my transaction history since there is no way to edit an existing card. I probably could've gone months without updating the card info in Apple Pay, but who knows? Better safe than sorry? No, with Barclay, it's always better sorry.

I'm not quite done yet. I noticed something like glitter in my wallet this afternoon. Then I found the source: the new card! Yes, the coating on the numbers is rapidly falling off. The card already looks more worn than some of my much older ones, and I can see that the number will be a challenge to read in no time. Could you cut more corners, Barclay? [Yes, I know you can.]

I was gonna spare you the story from two weeks ago when Barclay rejected a charge and then made it appear three times under authorizations, but I'm wound up. After Barclay denied the charge and then approved it, they wanted to put the burden on the merchant to have the extra authorizations removed. They gave me a phone number to pass along that, in typical Barclay style, wasn't for merchants at all; it routed to the same lousy customer care that all of their numbers seem to send people to. After spending an entire afternoon getting only one of these removed (they claimed the others were valid and that I'd made the same purchase twice, even though the merchant had already told them it was a one-time purchase), the authorization reappeared the next day. Worse, the "system" decided not to credit me for my recent payment via CheckFree. It posted to my account, yes, but it didn't reflect in available credit (which was strained from having one large charge post three times). The rep tried to explain that it can take weeks for them to get paid by CheckFree, and they have no requirement to credit me for that until it "fully" processes through the system. I explained that CheckFree guarantees the payor that the payment is delivered on that particular day. Nope, that's not how it is at all, she said, and we can't credit you for that payment that is listed as posted yesterday. They might discover that the money wasn't really there. Huh? The reason the payment posted is because it IS there. This was all a pretty horrible experience, as you can tell.

Anyway, for those who are on the fence or clamoring for the Silver card, let me just ask this: does this sound like a company with whom you'd like to do business? Does any other credit card company operate like this? Please say no. I feel like I'm dealing with a sub-prime lender or a pawn shop. There are multiple layers of incompetence spread across the globe, and the customer is frequently seen as an adversary.

Thanks to anyone that actually read this.

FriendlySkies

Wow, sorry to hear about all the problems you are having with Barclays. Despite disliking the fact that they have CS in India, I've never had any problems with my card being suspended, etc. Don't think any charges have been declined since I first got it (4Q 2013). Have not received my Aviator card yet, so we'll see how that goes..

As far as Apple Pay, I had to call in on Barclays and Bank of America to have it verified (though neither of them required me to answer any sort of verification questions).

rrgg

Carl, Is there any chance you thought you activated the original card last fall but did not?

Carl

Oh, I had to activate the original card immediately upon receipt (before removing the sticker). This weekend's rep made it abundantly clear that we are supposed to be activating our existing cards yet again because they're now AA (even if they don't say so). I did notice that the Aviator has a different phone number listed on the back, so perhaps there is a different group at Barclay handling these accounts now. It sounded like an internal issue that shouldn't affect us yet somehow was. At the same time, I found the whole thing hard to believe. Did anyone actually receive a notice asking them to activate their existing card now that the program has changed? I sure didn't.

talkandfly

Sorry for you pain. FWIW, I've had 2 US cards for years and this is SOP with this company. I am always nervous when I use the card because it is denied at least once a week. My FICO is always over 800 and we pay off the balance completely each month. Another "trick" we've been the victim of is a bill received from Barclay with no possible way to pay it via "snail mail" and get the payment credited on time. I've set up automated payments for the minimum balance due after 2 or 3 "late" charges a few years back so now there is never a late payment, and then wind up actually overpaying because I still pay the statement paper balance in full as soon as we get it. I call before each travel date to tell them where I will be and even have provided the name of the hotel chain. Despite my travel only being a few hundred miles form my home and despite the "heads up" I've provided, I get a "fraud alert" denial about half the time. Once, when I was frustrated after a "fraud" denial in a store that their database claimed was 600 miles from my home (that store was in the same zip code as my home address and I can physically see that store from my street), I told the CS rep that the inadequacies and denials were causing a lot of inconvenience to me and their only "help" was to threaten to cancel the card f I was so unhappy.

The ONLY reason I've suffered with Barclay all these years is the PQM's and mileage bonuses I've earned. Now that I am getting 2 AA-Red cards to replace my 2 high spend US cards, I am just waiting to see if I can get a Silver card (ostensibly in July?). I am already using my AA Citi cards and am having no problems. If the upgrade to Silver does not occur, I will not even miss any aspect of being a Barclay customer as I joyfully cancel my relationship with this troubled bank.

Carl

I'm very sorry to hear about your experience, and it also tells me things won't seem to improve the longer I am with Barclay. One of the reasons I was hoping for the Silver card was the guarantee that only US call centers provide support. But really, if the main reason I'm talking to someone is because they're busy denying charges at the Target down the street from home, it's not a great benefit.

And speaking of that, it happened again yesterday (yes, at the store within walking distance) on my new fully-activated Aviator Red. Only this time, the fraud specialist wasn't even in the U.S. After the person asked the usual questions, she told me to go back through the register. I asked her to stay on the line since I KNEW the charge would be declined again as always. She agreed but hung up while I was in line. And of course the charge was declined again. I wasn't about to give up, so I called again. This person also agreed to stay on the line and yet also hung up. Thankfully this charge actually went through.

I still don't understand why everything gets approved online but all routine purchases at regular stores get declined. I have no history of fraud or credit card theft. I've had exactly one issue where my credit card was used to charge a Disney vacation. The credit card issuer (US Bank) caught it immediately, called me to verify, and then sent me a new card overnight. That was in 2006, before it was common to require zip code and CVV2 validation for online purchases. Yet in 2015, this crazy company thinks everything is fraud, all of the time.

I wish NW still existed and that I still had that US Bank WorldPerks Visa. Now THOSE were good people.

Carl

While finishing lunch with an old friend today, I was interrupted by a phone call from a toll-free number. I didn't answer it, of course, but it kept calling. When done with lunch, I checked my voicemail and discovered that it was from (surprise surprise) Barclay. They wanted to verify suspicious activity on my card. Oh, sure. Just another weekday.

The messages told me to call a different number and enter a reference number. Because it's Barclay, that system said the reference number could not be found. I got an actual U.S. rep who said she needed to verify charges. Oh, but it was a fraud issue, so she would have to transfer me to a specialist. I forget what name she used, but it was different from the usual Account Protection Services. I got another U.S. person who needed to verify suspicious activity.

Today's problem transaction? Are you ready?! $9.80 for lunch. I've spent over $10k with them this month, but this is what they consider fraud. Why? "It's over 200 miles from your home." Yes, that's why I filed a travel notification (something I've never had to do with any other institution, even when traveling abroad). Just to make sure it hadn't dropped out of the system with the switch from US to AA, I checked my account while on the call. Yes, the travel notification (which started yesterday) was still right there, plain as day. So apparently they don't even do anything with those travel reports, which doesn't shock me either. $9.80 for lunch. They're actually paying people to go after these charges.

FallenPlat

This is all puzzling in the extreme. I got the Barclays US Airways card last December and have, among other things, charged a 1500 Euro hotel bill in Paris without any prior travel notification and without any problems at all. If I'm remembering correctly, I think there's something like a $25K credit limit on the card but I've never gone much over $5K in any month. I've never had any card from Barclays before

My red card hasn't yet appeared but, with this year's (first & last) Companion Pass, a 50K sign-up offer, no FX fees, and the current 1.5x miles promotion, I'm pretty happy. So far.

fordan

Barclays in my experience is on a hair trigger for fraud alerts. I've given the 800 number their fraud calls come from its own ringtone and set up my email to send a text message when I get an email from their fraud group. I've even been at a US-based specialty electronic chain with like 12 stores and said "Here's my card for my purchase, let me get my phone out for the fraud alert" and had it happen.