Poor Customer Service by Nicole Sarlie from Discovery Bank

On 14 June 2019 I closed my Discovery Card account. I fulfilled their prescribed procedures which included: Filling in their ‘Account Closure Form’ Paying the outstanding ammount reflecting at the time on online banking I emailed above form and proof of payment through to them, also on 14 June 2019.

On 21 June 2019 I phoned a customer service representative, Vivian to confirm closure of my account. He confirmed closure and provided call reference number ***

But soon there after it seemed a third party re-opened my account without my permission and commenced deducting fees from my account. I contacted Discovery Card several times to investigate why they will allow a third party to re-open my account without my permission, as this constitute as *****. The call reference numbers include: 23 August ’19 ref no: *** I spoke to a Mapume 15 Oktober ’19 ref no: *** I spoke to Chase and ref no *** I spoke to Prudent

It seemed an impossible task to get any helpful information on the subject as to why I were adviced my account is closed on the 21 June 2019 call, just that another third party can re-open it without my permission afterwards. This constitute as *****. As I already did all steps to close this account, I certainly were not willing to pay any more fees.

Discovery Card seemed incapable to communicate any helpful information to me no matter how many times I contacted them by phone. I will never have an account with a company where I can not readily have a walk in service in my area. For it seemed near impossible to close the account, and Discovery Card continued billing me monthly account fees. This, together with the the third party, now constitute as just over thousand rand, which they handed over to laywers to black list me! Of all things. And they are the ones who did not perform their duties.

I then opened a case with OBBSA. They reverted the case to Discovery representative Nicole Sarlie, who could not provide solutions. This was then reverted back to OBBSA who also procrastinate providing a rulling. Nicole Sarlie said they will write off the Discovery Card fees, and only expect payment for the third party which they allowed illigally to deduct fees. Now, it is no favour to deduct fees for a service I closed, did not use nor requested. Furthermore I waisted a lot of time to deal with the incompetence of Discovery Card’s customer service providers. Time is of more value than money, and Discovery Card is evidentually disrespectful of this fact. Furthermore Nicole Sarlie still handed over the full so called outstanding ammount which included their bankfees (which they seemingly are willing to deduct) for blacklisting during the period of investigation, prior OBBSA’s ruling. This is unreasonbale as we do not know what is outstanding until OBSSA provides a ruling, so how can they black-list anything?

Nicole Sarlie said she will retrieve the call where my account were confirmed closed (reference number ***, 21 June ’19 with Vivian). She said they will let me know of a date when I can come in and listen to this call. I welcomed this. But next moment all they could do is send a transcription of the call, not the actual call. When I insisted I want to rather listen to the actual call, they then mentioned they lost the ‘security’ call. Now, how can one send a transcription of a call you have not located? It seems they cannot locate any of above calls! Nicole Sarlie then suddenly needed all kinds of irrelevant information to evade responsibility. This information included details such as the number I phoned from 2 years ago. I provided, the date, customer support representative names, ánd reference numbers of various calls. This is more than sufficient information as the reference number is the key to locating a call on the system.

The whole thing is now a bit of a big business bullying situation. We all hate it when it happens to us, but how often do we do it in the capacity of our own work? Still truth remains, treating someone in a way you do not want to be treated, is not a good idea. It tends to take a full circle and becomes a culture of ‘no care customer care’. And when we get replaced by AI robots we protest: ‘how unfair’. Ultimately we are suppose to treat others as we want to be treated. With good service delivery the economy do better and consequently the banks do better. So quickly we forget it is all about relationships instead of regulations. In a sense I understand, yet not agree, why we think a robot can take the role of a human. Ultimately every human that forgot their true purpose in respecting and caring about creation and their Creator, is not truly adding value to life and consequently rather depleting the system. To truly care is good values, and a person that care should be valued. Hardly is someone of value merely due to some status whether it is intellegence, position, power, money or education. That is why it remains truly sad, as I do not want to speak to a robot, it is like speaking to a brick wall, but what is worse is a human that acts like a robot, simply not listening nor caring and merely ticking the box of regulation and procedure and dishing this to clients. This, when clients ironically are the people that contribute to our salaries. Biting the hand that feeds us is not conductive. And though clients can be unreasonable too, too often do we have to deal with one sided business which is evident in security calls that are only there to protect the interest of organsiations, but not the interest of clients. Rather than taking an interest in clients, we add more interest to whatever account they might have. Okay, all jokes aside, this is serious business.

Except for the missing ‘security calls’, Nicole mentioned the account had bank fees outstanding on the time of closure. Hence the account’s balance was not at R0 at the time of closure and could therefore, according to Discovery’s procedures, not be closed. Now first of all, why did Vivian confirm my account is closed when I enquired with call: *** on 21 June 2019. Secondly, could none of the other customer representatives advice me this when I enquired several times thereafter for the reason why my account was ‘re-opened’, or at leat I were placed under the impression by Discovery via representative Vivian, my account were closed and opened by a third party. Furthermore, these bank fees did not reflect on the internet banking site on the day that I paid the outstanding ammount. Possibly a glitch in the system that causes a delay from the time of billing to the time of refelecting it live on the online account?

But most importantly, banks is one of the only groups that black mail customers into continued business simply due to an outstanding account. In almost all other business the outstanding account is seperate from the running account / business contract. If you close your gym, phone or what ever account, you close the contract and there is no more running monthly fees. However the outstanding amount at the time remains outstanding until paid. This is then the amount that can be handed over for black-listing if due payment is not received in a given period. The banks should find ways to seperate these different accounts as they are two different issues all together. It actually goes agains customer protection rights that allows the cancellation of service with imidiate effect when this is requested by clients, and a client may not be forced into continued business. That I filled in forms and paid the outstanding amount, continually called and requested the cancelation of my account, should be sufficient to close the account. What ever was outstanding at that time, which according to you were one month’s bank fees, should then be send as a seperate outstanding account. I will pay this, no problem.

If the banks do not change this unreasonable procedure where they force people into business until they pay, simply adding more bills to the outstanding account, they increase poverty even further as if poor people cannot afford to close an account it simply keeps on amounting.

On 28/06/21 I listed a case with OBSSA which have on the most part been ignored by the designated member, Alison. She has provided no correspondence, reactions of any sort, not to speak of providing a ruling. It has been many months and she ignores emails send to her. They give one no choice but to believe they play a passive role in protecting the public against exploitation by banks. Does this organisation have a purpose?