chop chop

so the day finally came to close the credit card. very excited. thanks to some very conservative tax forms, i managed to get the CRAP taxed out of me last year which lead to a nice return this year. which in turn led me to paying off ALL of my credit card debt. sweet!but then the realization came to me of what i was about to do…the dreaded phone call to the credit card company…the relentless questions about why i was closing my account, didn’t i want to keep the card for emergency purposes, etc etc etc. so i had to come up with a plan. i didn’t want to get angry with the guy, but i needed to say something that would leave him no response.

his bright cheery voice welcomed me to the “special services” division. “i’d like to close my account,” I said. “I’m so sorry to hear that, sir,” he replied. “You’ve been with us for so many years, can I ask why you’d like to close your account?” The moment of truth.”I don’t want to talk about it,” I said plainly. “Please close my account.” Would it work? “Oh, ok,” he replied. Maybe I won? “Are you sure you don’t want to keep the card open? Maybe for emergency purposes?” I faltered. I hadn’t planned for round 2. Replying again with ‘I don’t want to talk about it’ would make me seem cold and heartless. I certainly didn’t want to have this nice man thinking I was that. “No,” I said flatly. “I just want to close my account. Please.”

And then the strangest thing happened. This wonderfully nice man who had once greeted me with excitement and warmth turned cold — dead cold. I had offended him. I could imagine him crumpling up his script for convincing people not to close accounts. I could see him sitting in the call center with a grimmace on his face — carefully looking around the room for his manager. He had failed to keep my account open…and now he owed me nothing. Robotically he spewed: “Your account will be closed today. It may take up to 36 hours to report to the credit bureaus.” etc etc. I let out a chuckle. It’s amazing how good he was at feigning interest and concern for my financial well-being. And once he realized I could not be won over, he turned cold and formal. Incredible how he could do that.

His personal relationships must be stellar.