British Expatriate Network

Am off to the UK on Thursday morning. Decided to call my credit card companies to get my PIN sorted out since they now have "Chip & Pin" and last time I was held up in Debenhams for ages arguing with the girl about whether she could swipe my card or not...

Anyway, my BA Visa card was a breeze - call, they put me into an automated service and then voila, I've got a PIN.

AmEx... No such luck. Someone in an Indian call centre told me I'd get the letter containing my PIN in 7 - 10 days... shock When I said this wasn't good enough I veered too far away from any of her scripted conversations so she was unable to help me.

I called back again, spoke to someone else who said the same thing, but finally transferred me to a person based in the US. I was very pleased and thought he would be able to help me.. until he launched into his "I'm a big Anglophile" speech.... he called me "luv" "luvvy", said "bollocks" and "toffee pudding" (?!?!) and then said that of course there was a faster way to get a PIN - AmEx want me to spend money don't they?

He put me on hold. Then came back on and said, no, in fact AmEx don't want me to spend money. They want me to wait 7-10 days to get my PIN in the mail.
twisted twisted

Am going to try again tomorrow in daylight hours, but I can't get my head around why a company who makes money when I spend it, would try and make it harder for me to do so...

Have checked http://www.chipandpin.co.uk and it says that all retailers should continue to accept swipe and sign cards, but I can't wait to try it out... will end up shouting at someone, I can feel it.

Stel.

I will never use American Express for the rest of my natural (or unnatural) life after a long, painful run-in with them, that culminated in them sending me for about a year-and-a-half, monthly bills for the outstanding sum of $1.27.

They were oblivious to the irrefutable fact that they had by this time spent about four times that amount in postage.

Whenever they phoned me I told them bluntly that I would rather have something spiked and painful shoved up my bottom, or hell to freeze over than ever pay them this princely sum and they could take any action they wished.

But for a long time the automatons on the other end of the receiver obviously thought this was some sort of light-hearted jesting on my part until finally this last lingering torment from this terminally stupid company stopped as well.

Given the number pf places that accept Amex in the UK, why even bother taking it?

One problem might be that no UK AMEX cards that I have or know of use chip and Pin - I still sign everything when I pay with AMEX - they never even sent me a PIN.......the number of places still refusing to accept it is still quite high though....