Citibank review: Credit card

A few years ago, my wife had a Citibank credit card. There were some non-authorized charges on the account. Instead of dealing with the issue Citibank tacked on late charges and interest. When we finally were able to reach someone with the knowledge to fix the situation, they did, but left a few cents on the account. So, the process started all over again — late charges and interest. I took several months for Citibank to fix the issue a second time. We closed the account and have not done business with Citibank except when there is a great deal on the first purchase with a new card.

We will then open an account, get the deal and close the account, until I learned that closing an account actually hurts your credit score. Now I just leave them open and do not use them.

Last fall I was planning a RV trip to visit a new grandbaby. I was looking for a deal on gas and Citibank and Shell had and account that would save $.50 a gallon on some number of gallons. I applied and was approved. With a credit score north of 800 I knew that approval would not be an issue. What is an issue is that they gave me a very low limit and I exceeded the limit on the trip. I have asked repeatedly for Citibank to raise my limit and they refuse. I have also requested that they lower the limit on the Sears Card to offset the limit increase on the Shell Card and they refuse.

My income meets their guidelines as I requested an increase on the Sears card, and it was granted after I requested that they lower the limit to offset the requested limit increase on the Shell card.

When I request a limit increase on the shell card on the website, I am gold that I have not had the card long enough to warrant a credit line increase, but Citibank refuses to tell me what a long enough time is to qualify for an increase.

All of this makes no sense to me. I was really hoping that when the new CEO took over, she would make changes that would lead to Citibank being more customer focused. It appears that the opposite has happened.