I am holding a credit card of Mashreq with the Novo Cinema package. During the month of May I have not done any purchase with my credit card and my outstanding, all dues, were cleared until May. In the bank statement, a charge was shown for Novo ticket charge tax. I enquired about the charge with the customer care, but they were not able to explain clearly about the charge and in the month of June statement I received a late payment charge for that statement. I am disappointed with the bank as they did not clearly explain the details of this charge, as I have not made any purchase with the card that month. Kindly help me solve the issue.
From Mr Mohzin Nazeemudeen
Abu Dhabi
The management of Mashreq responds: Thank you for highlighting Mr Nazeemudeen’s concern to us.
Mr Nazeemudeen has raised a concern regarding the late payment fee levied on his credit card due to the VAT charges on his Novo Cinema tickets.
We wish to confirm that Mashreq had sent SMS notifications to all its Novo Cinema package holders regarding the VAT charges, which were not debited for the transactions executed between January and March 2018.
These charges were debited subsequently as Novo claimed them from Mashreq.
Our investigation reveals that an SMS was sent to Mr Nazeemudeen in the month of May 2018 along with the monthly credit card statement.
The payment was not made within the due date of the card, hence the late payment penalty was levied.
As per our discussion with Mr Nazeemudeen, he acknowledged that he had not checked his card statement and does not recall receiving the SMS.
As an exception we have decided to reverse the late payment fee of Dh395 as the VAT charges have now been recovered from the customer.
Mr Nazeemudeen has been contacted and informed of the same. He is much satisfied with the swift resolution.
We take this opportunity to thank Gulf News, once again, for bringing this issue to our notice.
Mr Nazeemudeen responds: Mashreq credit card team contacted me and discussed about the issue. I pointed out my problems and that no purchase was made in the month of May and regarding the charges, they explained that the VAT amount was not debited during January-March and were charged in May. After finalising the issue, they agreed to cancel the late payment fee.
Thanks to Gulf News for helping me solve the issue.
(Process initiation: July 11. Response from organisation: July 15. Reader confirmation: July 17.)
Editor’s note: Do you have similar issues that you would like to raise with us? You can write to us at readers@gulfnews.com.
