ABSA homeloans terrible service and client account mismanagement

We have a home loan account with ABSA which we have faithfully been paying every month by way of debit order as set by the bank. When interest rates change we normally received a formal notification of the intended change followed by a debicheck change for our bank account to accept the new monthly values.

Last week we received a SMS stating we must accept a new debicheck on our account, no formal pre notification of its intent, nothing. Logging into our bank account we notice its for ABSA and seems to be for our home loan account.

After sending an email to ABSA inquiring about the SMS and the reason for the SMS we receive a response from a Abbygail Aitken stating that apparently our account is in arrears from July 2024 when a short payment was made (we do not control nor make physical payments) and then adds another short payment was made in June but, however we had made a payment on the difference???? (We have never made any additional payments ever on our home loan account)

No mention is made of the amount value that is in arrears. We have no record on statements that the account is in arrears nor did we ever make any payment on the so-called arrears account??

We send another response e-mail asking why the account is in arrears eluding to the fact that the monthly amounts are taken by ABSA via debit orders as set by ABSA, and not being done by means of manual payments from our side. We also point out no notifications were received from ABSA to any arears amounts or outstanding funds.

A short email from ABSA is received from Patience Maphanga stating we must accept the debicheck mandate and settle the amount of R26.27 and that we must contact the collections department....

We then try to contact the collections department, which is a terrible and non user friendly system, and after holding on, we are told that we reached the card division..( we phoned the correct number for collections as detailed in the e-mail). We are then transferred to collections or so we are told and after holding on the line is dropped from ABSA side. We repeat this process trying to contact collections several times without success, either being transferred incorrectly or the call being dropped.

ABSA - your service is pathetic and non existent.

1. Why must we be held to account for an amount of R26.27 if our monthly payments are processed by means of set value debit orders as activated by ABSA / yourselves? 2. We never received any notification or statement reflecting our account is in arrears, especially in 2024 for which you now send a new Debicheck request in 2025?? 3. In our e-mails we requested proof of the arrears in the form of statements, this is being ignored to date. 4. Why is the new debicheck you sent exactly the same value / amount as before which is currently being debited yet you state the new debicheck is to allow for the arrears and then also inform me I must make arrangements to pay the arrears amount of R26.27 ??? ( two different stories not making sense) ABSA must really be struggling financially for R26.27... yet you are accountable for setting the correct debit order values from your side.