Complaint Review: Emerge Mastercard - Atlanta Georgia

I will be filing a complaint with the Minnesota Attorney General's Office tomorrow regarding this so called company, which will hopefully result in a class action lawsuit against Emerge.

I have had an Emerge Mastercard account for several years and in the last several months have noticed some suspicious activity on my account. I actually need to go back in my old files and see what my original interest APR was because it is now 30.08% and I don't ever recall having a rate this high!

Next, I had noticed some charges by a company called moviepluss.net based in California (I live in Minnesota) for $39.95, usually one charge per month, but, June had 2 charges. I have never heard of this company, so, I looked it up online. It is basically a porn site that I have never used, let alone given my credit card to. THESE WERE UNAUTHORIZED CHARGES! When I called Emerge to dispute the charges they gave me the run around. Finally, after my 3rd call to them, they told me I had to call their dispute resolution office during business hours. When I called that department they told me I had to fill out a form disputing the charges. This call was on June 25. They mailed the form on June 27, but neglected to mention that Moviepluss.net made another charge on June 23. This charge did not show up on the June statement. So, even after I made them aware these were fraudulent charges, they continued to allow the company to keep charging my credit card. Every other credit card company in the U.S. automatically stops any further charges by suspicious companies until the dispute is resolved. I had to call Emerge back to close the account from further charges.

When the dispute form arrived, I filled it out and faxed it back on July 3rd, making sure to print a fax report verifying Emerge received the form. I then opened a new credit card account with a different company transferring the balance from Emerge, minus the fraudulent charges. After not hearing anything from Emerge, I called them today, July 17. They told me they received the balance transfer payment on July 15. I told them I wanted the account completely closed out with a zero balance. They argued with me saying that we still owed money because of the fraudulent charges they refused to remove, including the June 23rd one I just found out about. They also conveniently added an annual $59 fee!!! The manager, Betty Wiser, nicely advised me she would waive the annual fee...gee, how nice of her. She adamantly refused to remove or charge back the fraudulent charges. She advised me that the dispute investigation could take 60 days and couldn't do anything with those charges in the meantime. She then told me I had to call the dispute resolution office again.

Ms. Wiser also advised me that I had to call Moviepluss.net to have them remove the charges! So, just to try and move things along I called the number for Moviepluss.net on my statement and was put on hold for a half an hour which was a continuous loop of "Please hold and someone will be with you shortly or for your convenience press the # key to leave a message and someone will get right back to you" and then a sound like someone picked up the call and put it right back on hold! So, I pressed the # button and left a message with no return call as of yet.

Obviously from all the claims I've seen on various complaint websites, including this one, Emerge is a company that needs to have legal action taken against it! As I stated earlier, I will be filing a complaint with the Minnesota Attorney General's Office! Hopefully, I will be able to report back here that a resolution is reached soon!

Dan

New Prague, Minnesota

U.S.A.