Greg says he inadvertently authorized Citi to share his personal info because he applied for an online rebate. He writes:

I bought a netbook through an internet-based retailer, and got a mail-in rebate. The rebate was issued in the form of a Citi prepaid card, issued by a company owned by Citi called “e-count”. After about 4 months went by the rebate finally arrived, and I opened it and everything looked in order, so I set it aside. Tonight I was going through the papers on my desk and found all the various papers that were enclosed with the card. I was throwing them away, when I noticed a very small form with very small text that said something about privacy. I decided to read it on a whim, and discovered that apparently Citi reserves the right to sell all of your information to the highest bidder WITHOUT your consent, unless you mail them an opt-out form or call a phone number. To be more specific, the section of the form in question says:

“We may disclose personal information about you to the following types of nonaffiliated third parties:

-Financial services providers, such as companies engaged in banking, credit cards, consumer finance, securities, and insurance, and

-Non-financial companies, such as companies engaged in DIRECT MARKETING and the selling of consumer products and services.”

So my understanding is that since I got this rebate card, my name is probably on mailing lists for tons of junk mail. Since this thing took 4 months to finally arrive, I’m sure my information has been bought and sold several times by now, so my opting out probably won’t mean anything. Plus, it says on the form that there’s a 30 day waiting period for your “privacy choices” to become effective, should you choose to opt out, so opting out is probably technically impossible anyhow. People really ought to be made aware of Citi doing this, as I almost missed it myself. I am not happy.

Has anyone used a prepaid Citi card and found themselves bombarded by marketers?

(Photo: frankieleon)

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