Charles says he first canceled his Chase credit card in 2008, but was surprised to find it was still open a year later. He canceled it again, but Chase kept hassling him with mailings, and when he called to see what was up he was told the company was keeping in contact with old customers to comply with the CARD act.

He writes:

In October of 2008, I tried to cancel a credit card from United/Chase. I kept getting “convenience checks” and a year later in Oct 2009, I found out, they never cancelled my account. I did (again) and they confirmed. Big surprise when this week I got “important information regarding changes to your account”. So, I call again. First lady tells me it was a computer glitch and a lot of customers with closed accounts got that info. When I kept asking her how I can get Chase to stop sending me crap, she transferred me to a supervisor, except that I got transferred to the fraud department where I had to give all my info. Finally, I get some supervisor who tells me that she will send me another letter that my account was closed and that the CARD act actually requires them to contact customers with closed accounts as far back as 2008.

By then I had wasted another 20 minutes of my life, so I reconfirmed my address (again) and let it go.

None of the stuff I’ve read about the CARD act — which goes into effect today — mentioned such a mandate, but maybe one of you knows different. Has anyone else gotten mailings from your old credit card company?

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