Absa Payment Holiday a Joke

When lockdown happened I was without pay (like many people) for 5 weeks, and am on short time since it has been lifted (we get paid for hours worked only, when we are shifted to work).

Absa was kind enough to offer me a payment holiday for 3 months on my personal loan. I app**** in April just after lockdown started and received correspondence via MMS and accepted the terms offered ( what else could I do - I was not able to pay). Since then the debit order for the monthly payment on the personal loan has been going off of the account anyway. There is little to no money in there so this results in the debit order bouncing and a R150 penalty for this. Every month for 3 months. Should enough money come in to the account, the debit order sits there and then goes off automatically anyway. I then have to phone in, be asked "am I sure I have a payment holiday" each time, and have the debit order reversed. And as the personal loan goes off, other smaller debit order which I am attempting to keep up payments on are then being rejected too, resulting in further R150 penalties. FOR EACH DEBIT ORDER. If I add them up I could probably pay a months premium on the personal loan. They decided to take the debit order twice this month.

I have been at Absa bank since 2004, but I am very seriously considering moving after this utter sham of administration. Barely making ends meet as it is.

I need to speak to a consultant who will actually get back to me. One consultant was very helpful and said she would escalate it further but I have heard nothing since.