Repeated Credit Card Mailers

I honestly can’t say I despise junk mail as much as most people. I think it is a complete waste of natural resources, and most of the offers are worth less than the paper they are printed on. Yet, as a graphic designer by trade, I try to view as much advertising material as possible that might spark ideas for my future work. The more take in the better to fill my creative synapses with material that might be useful later. So, sorry, I’ll leave the I hate all junk mail rant for one of our other fine authors.

For me, I really despise the financial offers of any kind, especially those that put your identity at risk. Not that they are sharing any information that couldn’t be grabbed by other means, but they provide a way that an identity thieve can quite easily forge your info and grab a line of credit in your name. We have a personally sized shredder on a kitchen counter that takes good care of each and every one of these offers.

How many mortgage offers do I need to receive and not respond to before I get off the “you may qualify for XXX savings per month on your payment by refinancing? How low does my interest rate need to be before I don’t appear on the “potential sucker” list for the next loan officer? I know they are rolling the dice by hitting all the home buyers in the last few years that may be prime to refinance, but can we please provide an update to all the list brokers that I am fine so don’t waste the money sending me an offer? Problem is, list brokers make their money supplying you with as many names as possible within the requested demographic, so I am afraid I’m stuck on that list.

Now let’s get to the one in particular that truly causes an involuntary roll of the eyes when I see their envelopes arrive in my box. Several companies do this, but none is a bigger offender than CapitalOne. “What’s in your wallet?” How about “What’s in your mailbox?” CapitalOne has, likely from some sort of market research, determined that sending you the same offer repeatedly over the course of a few weeks increases the chances you will take the offer. At first, I thought they may be sending one to me personally, one to my wife and perhaps one to my business (located at the same home office address). Nope, this is the exact same offer, perhaps repacked slightly with a different header design and intro text to the letterhead, but the guts of it exactly the same. “Maybe if we just give it this twist, that’ll get ‘em.”

If I don’t respond to the one, I’m not going to respond to the next three in the same month. Really, I mean it. Go ahead perhaps and send me one every 6 months or so, I can see the logic in that. Admittedly, when I started my business I used one of these mailed offers to get my business card, giving me a year of no interest for some start-up capital. I managed it carefully and to date still, have not paid any interest on the card because I never carry a balance. I’m not their prime target customer, I know because they make their big money on interest.

I’m still a customer of CapitalOne, mainly because I have miles built up I still plan to use, and I like their online services. Why is it then they still keep sending me these repeat new customer credit card offers? With all their massive technology and advertising dollars, you would think they could match up their customer records with their mailing list to weed out a few unnecessary mailers. What a novel concept, maybe I should sell it to them. On top of this, as a customer, I get their personal loan offers, balance transfers, and small business loan offers. They may actually spend more on mailing me things than they make on my business. Not really I’m sure, but it sure seems like it.

Now here is where I have to admit my laziness being a part of the problem. If you haven’t noticed this before, on these offers they have a notice where you can get off their list and no longer receive mailers. I’ve seen it a few times, but never managed to make the call before the letter has hit the shredder. And what if I do actually want to get a different credit card down the road? Can I elect to get one a year…please?

Oh well, it’s easier to complain than actually do something about it, right?