I used to work for this company. It is nothing other than legal loan sharking. The accounts are setup so that the customers billing cycle is something ridiculous, like between the 3rd Thursday of every month or something. Of course, the customer isn't made aware of the billing cycle, so the likliehood of missing a payment is greatly increased. Almost all accounts are promos, or promotional offers, which means you get a no interest loan for say the first 3 months to a year, but if you ever pay even one day late, or have any remaining balance at the end of your promo, you get the entire wad of interest tacked on. And the payments always had a weird way of being late at least once. I talked to people, many of them elderly people buying Craftmatic or Select Comfort beds, whos account balance would jump from 500.00 to 2500.00 in a month, just because of a payment received one day late. I am not saying HC holds onto payments until they're late, but they just bank on the idea that most folks will be late at least once. And the website payments are a joke, don't ever use their website. Archaic, convoluted, 3rd party website that is down half the time. In a nutshell, they prey on what our supervisor liked to call the 'Non Credit Savvy Customer'. If hes still there, ask for him by name. Paul Dickard - and if its any consolation, last I heard, they've gone through massive layoffs, something like 75%. Predatory, subprime lending at its best - thats the HelpCard. aka HC Processing. aka Dent-A-Med.
