Make Sure Your CitiBusiness Account Is REALLY Closed

I had an interesting thing happen today. When I got home, I noticed a statement letter from a CitiBusiness AAdvantage account I opened December of last year, but closed about 6 months ago. I thought that was a little strange, but I figured it was probably just one of those residual zero-balance statements I get once in a long while on a card I never use. Although I have never received a statement 6 months after closing an account before!

Once I opened it, I was shocked to see a $75 annual fee with the payment due by December 27! Of course, I immediately called up CitiBusiness. I explained to the customer service representative what happened, and after a few minutes of looking through my account, she said she knew exactly what was going on.

For those of you who have opened a CitiBusiness AAdvantage account before (or 5 or 6 ;)), you know that in addition to the 16-digit account number printed on your card, you also get a separate, distinct 16-digit business account number. This is so you can open more credit card accounts for your employees, and all of those individual credit card accounts (in addition to yours) will go under the top-level business account number.

Well apparently, the representative who helped me close my account 6 months ago managed to close my credit card, but failed to close down the entire business account. Hence, I was still being charged the $75 annual fee on my open business account. The representative I spoke to tonight apologized for the oversight, and assured me that the $75 would be credited back to me, and the business account would also be closed for good.

So if you have a CitiBusiness AAdvantage credit card that you closed recently, it doesn't hurt to double check and verify with a representative that both your credit card and your business accounts have been properly closed.