Anyone else feeling ripped off by Checks Unlimited?

My repeat order contained surprise charges.

I've been banking at the Bank of America branch at East Front Street and Sanford Avenue ever since it was Crestmont Savings & Loan (now how many banks ago was that!).

And ever since I began, the banks have used Checks Unlimited to fulfill customer's check orders.

Today I noticed I was running low on checks and decided to reorder online.

The Checks Unlimited site is pretty straightforward if a little clunky (you can visit it here).

You pick your design. Add any frou-frous you may want.

Enter your transit code (this identifies your financial institution and branch location) and your account number and you're good to go.

Or at least you should be.

When you get to the order review page, the company tries to hustle you with "check and identity protection".

Even though you decline, the additional fee continues to show on your order total, until you decline the offer two more times!

This may be intentionally designed to play on fearful older customers, but I am not one such. And it annoyed me.

But wait, there's more (as they say on late night TV)!

After getting to the order total page and giving my credit card information, the final order total page (see above) shows on screen.

That's when I noticed a $13.80 "handling fee" that appeared nowhere before in the entire order process.

So, let's review --

• I am a repeat customer of many years;
  
  
• All the information is already in their system, including the last check # they printed for me;
  
  
• The printing and binding is automated;
  
  
• The finished checks plus a register and a popup storage box are machine-inserted into a pre-addressed plastic mailing sleeve -- all automated

And the customer is charged a "handling fee" that is a whopping 26% of the merchandise total (it's a bigger bite if your order is smaller).

But it gets worse.

Checks Unlimited has the nerve to include the "handling fee" as a taxable item, meaning the State of New Jersey gets an extra little bite out of you though I would dispute that this is a "service" in the "goods and services" definition the state uses.

A thoroughly distasteful experience, but this is a business that has the customer by the short hairs, so to speak.

Like AT&T used to tell angry customers: You can always use the other phone company.

Other phone company? What other phone company?

I'm not a happy camper.

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 -- Dan Damon [ follow ]

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