In this web site, I often advocate careful fine-print reading. It appears that I still didn't spend sufficient time in fine prints and misread the terms in my recently discussed Fleet 0% APR balance transfer offer. Shame on me and kudos to Fleet's clever wording.
I became aware of my mistake when I checked out my online Fleet account last night. Instead of showing my total balance transfer amount of $12,000 as my balance, the site shows my balance as $12,009.11. As I drilled down further, Fleet closed my first statement on 8/12, and charged $9.11 as interest for my transferred balance.
My initial reaction is Fleet must have messed up my promotion, but after 10 minutes digging into the paperworks, I concluded that I misread Fleet's offer.
In the original offer, Fleet wrote:
"Save with 0% Intro APR on purchases, if you transfer a balance now.* And as long as you make required payments on time, this 0% APR is good until November 2005. After that, or if you have no balances to transfer now, you can still save with a low rate on purchases, currently 8.9% APR,* which is also the rate on balance transfers.*" (Bolded text and asterisks as they are in original mailing.)
In hindsight, what Fleet wants to say is if I make a balance transfer, my purchase APR will be 0% APR for 15 months. However, for whatever reason, I thought it's 0% APR for balance transfer if I make such a request at the time of application. Clever wording on Fleet's part by putting balance transfer and 0% APR in the same paragraph, and carelessness on my side.
I immediately made a payment of $12,030 out of my VirtualBank account to the Fleet account (thanks god I still have enough cash in hand). I expect the mistake is going to cost me up to $30. Had Fleet closed the statement after 30 days, my loss is going to be north of $80. A good lesson, and luckily for me, it is not a too expensive one.