Beware: Macy's American Express Credit Card

Recently, I was the victim of fraudulent charges made to my Macy’s credit card account. When I called in 2 days after the charges were made to report them, I was told “no problem, we’ll take care of this.”  Then I was also told that there are problems within Macy’s where the cashiers can inadvertently bill other people’s charges to your account, because people are allowed to charge items to their Macy’s account WITHOUT ID. They just have to enter the social security number or telephone number and then sign for it. To add insult to injury, a few days later I received a note demanding I fill out a form, BY HAND, and include 2 forms of identification that include my signature. I do not keep my passport in the house, but in a safety deposit box, and this necessitated an extra trip. I was told in the letter that if I did not send the form in within 15 days, then it would be assumed I would accept responsibility for the fraudulent charges.

What? On what planet does that make good customer sense? When I called Macy’s to ask about this and to explain what a hassle this was for a problem that was not my fault, they said they were sorry, but there was nothing they could do about it. By the way, they also said I only needed to send in 1 form of ID. They “were in the process of getting the form changed.” Oh thanks for telling me before my trip to the bank for my passport.

Once these charges are settled, I plan to cancel my Macy’s American Express credit card account—it’s not worth the risk or hassle to deal with their problems any longer.

But just for the record: macy's promise to only hold you liable for $50 of fraudulent charges is apparently no longer in force.