I just finished reading an amazing New York Times article about what kind of data is known about you by your credit card companies. It didn’t improve my already low opinion of them.

Some of the data potentially kept on file by the credit card companies: your martial status, the best time to contact you, what is the best approach to pressure you to collect past due monies (bullying or sympathetic), what kind of person you are, interests, socioeconomic status, etc. It would be creepy enough to think that the credit card companies were storing this information if you gave it to them voluntarily, but they are not. Your personality type, for instance, is predicted using data like what you buy using your credit card and where you live.

The mathematically-based models not only predict a customer’s personality, but also future paying history and the best psychological approach in collecting overdue payments and defaulted accounts. Credit card collection reps are rigorously trained to use this information to the company’s advantage. Listen to this story contained within the New York Times article:

We were introduced to Donna Tiff, a 49-year-old Missouri woman through the Center for Responsible Lending, an advocacy organization that Tiff contacted after companies began hounding her about the $40,000 she owed on multiple cards.

“The phone would ring nonstop,” she told me. “I would get on, crying, and tell them I don’t believe in suicide, but I’m close. That I’m going to file for bankruptcy, and then you’ll get nothing.”

And then Tracey came along. Tracey had talked to Tiff several times and noticed that there was a mistake on her account — an automatic payment was going to be deducted twice from her checking account. If that happened, Tiff’s other checks would bounce.

“I told her, thank you so much for catching that,” Tiff recalled. “And then we talked for over an hour about my problems and raising kids. She was amazing. She was so similar to me. She gave me her direct number and said that I should call her directly anytime I had any questions or just needed to talk about what was going on.”

Over the next three years, Tiff paid off the entire $28,000 she owed Bank of America and spoke regularly with Tracey, she said. And the $12,000 she owed on other cards? Well, those companies didn’t have a Tracey. They never got fully repaid.

It’s a heartwarming story. Unless you’ve seen how people like Tracey are schooled in the art of bonding. What are the odds that the random customer assistant who dealt with Tiff would have so much in common with her and manage to strike such a close bond?

One Bank of America executive acknowledged that Tiff probably could have cut her debt in half just by asking. Much of what they’re paying, after all, is fees and interest that Bank of America itself tacked on.

Tiff was asked if she ever asked Tracey to write off the late fees and the interest charges.

“Oh, no,” she told me. “She was so kind to me. How could I ask her for something like that?”

Anyone else out there gotten this kind of “special” customer service? Leave a comment!

Related posts:

1. Are Credit Card Companies Now Willing to Settle Debt for Less? There have been many reports in the news lately that...
2. Credit Card Companies Instituting “Minimum Annual Purchase” Policies We just learned Citibank is informing their customers it will...
3. Trouble Paying Your Credit Card Bills? Card Issuers Want to Help At least that is what the some of the major...
4. Beware of Credit Card Foreign Transaction Fee Fever If it sounds like a new strain of flu that...
5. Even After New Credit Card Laws, Interest Rates Can Increase – Without Notification We’ve written about the ...