I just rec’d an invitation, and was tempted. It clearly states on the back no annual fee, no account setup fee, no extra card fee. As I said I was very tempted.
Initially reading the negative reviews I was of the impression that the people complaining had just failed to make their minimum payments on time, so it was sorta on them. Some posters here made comments which also were of this ilk. Some of these comments were valid, but others were not, I feel.
The problem is, the more comments I read, the more it becomes apparent that while some folks report never having had any issues….there are recurring problems mentioned by different folks, which do not appear to be the fault of the cardholder whatsoever.
1) after a period of time, Merrick will change the terms and begin to charge an annual fee, apparently broken down into a monthly amount charged each cycle.
2) there seems a huge problem with payments not getting posted to the account when the payments are made…even using their own website or app. THAT is really, really terrible; and I do not believe that to be the fault of the holder….the comment came up too often. No reason a CC company should not have an electronic payment post to a user’s account within 24 hours or less. I always pay my CC bill online a day or two before it’s due. Apparently this causes huge problems with Merrick. Sorry, but what good is a credit card if you have to make sure you make your payment 10 days-2 weeks before the due date in order to avoid it being recorded as posting late ? Absurd.
3) They seem to side with merchant on disputed transactions/transaction amounts….that is really, really terrible. Again, NO CC company I have ever had, ever did that.
I think these 3 reasons alone are enough to stay clear. It was tempting, it really was, and initially I was dismissing the negative reviews I have read here and elsewhere. But the same criticisms keep recurring…and that is always a red flag.
Glad I found this site.