Maybe it’s just me, but Citibank has been sending me more and more snail mail with balance transfer checks inside. I can recognize the envelopes without even opening them. Even though in the past there may have been a good no-fee 0% APR balance transfer offer, I’ve just kept getting 0% with a 3%-5% fee for the past few years so I decided to stop them for both me and my wife due to the sheer volume.
Stopping these balance transfer checks from piling up in your mailbox is actually quite simple; you just have to ask them. Calling in is one option, but the easiest way is to log into your online account and send them a secure online message. Here’s my simple script that you can copy and paste:
Subject: Balance Transfer Checks in Mail
Hello,
I would like to officially request that I no longer be sent promotional balance transfer checks in the mail. I don’t want checks sitting in my mail box. Thank you.
This is the standard Citibank copy/paste reply:
We appreciate the opportunity to assist you and apologize for any inconvenience you may have experienced. As you requested, we have processed your privacy choices. Please allow 30 days for these choices to become effective. If there is any way we can be of further assistance, please feel free to contact us.
Done! This works for all the card issuers as far as I’m aware of, not just Citibank, and you can keep getting your paper statements. If you don’t want any unsolicited offers of credit or insurance sent to you, you can also enroll at OptOutPrescreen.com. This is not the same situation as these Citibank checks, because if you already have a relationship with them they can send you junk until you opt out.
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Thanks for that bit of relief.
Amen! Much appreciated!
Those balance transfer checks are the worst. BofA is an even worse offender than Citi. I’ve been receiving BofA transfer checks every other week for the last two years.
Thanks for the tip, I requested both of them to stop sending me these things. We shall see…
Trying. Thanks.
How timely! I received 3 such letters in the mail today, ugh.
Done! Thank you so much for the tip!
Thanks Jonathan. This is what a good blog post should be (I’m taking notes). Short, if possible, a clear call to action and simple steps to help the people reading it act on the call.
I’ve been getting these for years and was just simply annoyed by them as they went into the recycling bin. No more!
I opt out by tearing them up and tossing them into the recycling bin. 🙂
I requested them to stop sending me these checks a couple of years back. since then i have been getting the same number of mailings except now there is only the letter and no checks.
Thank you very much! It’ll be so nice not to get those anymore.
no luck here….
Thanks for contacting us about your Capital One® account. Unfortunately,
the option to be excluded from our balance transfer solicitations is not
available at this time. We’re sorry for any inconvenience this may
cause.
If you have any additional questions, please give us a call at
1-800-955-7070. Our Customer Service Representatives are available 24
hours a day, 7 days a week.
Sincerely,
Capital One
My mother had these stolen from her three times. Each time Capital One paid the fraudulent charges, but they kept sending the checks out! She had to close her account with them.
I do get them from Citi, but I have 4 cards with Chase and I swear I get one set of checks per card every two weeks. So two envelopes that I believe contain my full account #’s all over a bunch of checks, every week.
There have even been days when all four came at the same time. SO RIDICULOUS. Such a giant waste of paper. I don’t even open them either, I just assume anything from chase is junk and tear it up.
Only positive is that it gives the post office more business, just like all the empty pre-paid offer reply envelopes that I stick in the outbox each week.
@NV – Thanks for sharing. Not very consumer friendly on Capital One’s part. Only good news for me is that they don’t send me that many checks, just maybe one a month. I only have one account with them, though.
I just received my weekly batch from Citi today. I wouldn’t mind them but the BT fee is always an insulting 4%. Thanks for the info. I’ll be sending the message tomorrow.
so you have a suggested copy and paste, and mock them for doing the same?
When I get junk mail I don’t like, I write ‘return to sender’ on it and stick it back in the mailbox. I doubt I’ll be getting any more promotional mail from Citi or anybody else 🙂
I think it’s a fair way to combat the incessant and blatant advertising going on in the world, I’m not how much it costs the post office, but after one or two times I doubt they’ll be wasting their time sending me anymore mail. If we all did this we could put a stop to junk mail nationwide 🙂 🙂
@James Miller – Umm… that was the joke? Why wouldn’t they copy and paste? Copy and paste has saved the world millions of man-hours, the inventor should have received Nobel Prize in economics!
@Josh – With how big these companies are, I would be surprised if that would work. Some people use the prepaid reply envelopes and tape them onto bricks, but I doubt that works either besides generating some more income for the Post Office.
Thanks for the copy and paste email solution!
Citi is such a rip-off bank, everyone else charges 2 or 3 percent, they are charging 5 percent. Stay away from Citi if you can.
Opted out. Took 2 minutes of phone time. I did call in the middle of the day, so there was no wait. I have no need for checks like this, and it made me really nervous having checks floating around with my name on it. They must make a lot of money off these!