Yesterday I got a call from AMEX from the number 800-290-1289 at around 6:30PM. Usually I don’t pick up calls from numbers I don’t know, but after that Comenity debacle, I decided to pick up the call. The guy said he was from AMEX and that this wasn’t a solicitation and that I was under a financial review. I didn’t ask him what prompted it; at first I thought it was all the dining I had been doing but after I thought about it some more, I realized it was due to the bounced ACH from last week. I had gotten a new AMEX card and was setting up Autopay and stupidly typed in my savings account number instead of my checking account number. No, I didn’t add a ‘saved bank’ from another card because AMEX no longer lets me have more than 1 card per login. Naturally I didn’t have any money in the savings account and so I got an email from AMEX saying it bounced and they’d try again in a few days. I then moved some money over and they swept it just fine the next day.
Anyway, the guy just asked me basic financial questions like my job, income, and whether I owned/rented. He then asked me to provide either 1 or 2 bank statements that I’ve been using to pay my AMEX cards. I told him I’d provide 2 of them. He then sent me a link of instructions on how to submit the documents. He told me NOT to rename any of the files, etc. I found it a bit odd he didn’t ask for a tax transcript, but maybe that’s next. Or maybe this is a mini-FR due to the bounced check and not due to shenanigans.
Lesson learned – double check your account numbers when setting up AMEX payments so you don’t bounce any checks. I don’t think it was SOLELY the bounced check; I’m guessing it’s the bounced check, all the new cards and ramp up in spend. Just a hurricane of stuff.