President's Choice Financial Reviews

Put almost 3000 dollars onto our card, (4 months of grocery money), after receiving our student loan. Checked 3 days later, and they had reduced our credit limit by... $3000! We now have no money to eat for the next four months, despite 8 years of perfect payment history. Thanks PC Financial for threatening our families' livelihood.

In July I was accosted in Shoppers Drug Mart by PC rep who took my DL info. 30 days later I received & activated my card with $10000 limit. Requested a balance transfer. Told 3-5 days. A week later, card is BLOCKED. No explanation. Then told they couldn't confirm my identity. Want all kinds of personal id faxed to some number (could be INDIA for all I know). Then told they do not keep records of application or DL info from the PC rep at Shoppers Drug Mart. What kind of company mails out cards with $10000 limits and does a credit check only AFTER the customer tries to make a purchase and BLOCKS the card they just activated with a rep on the phone...exactly! So I cancelled the card. PC Financial is incompetent, a scam or both.

I got my MasterCard recently approved for $8000. I spent 1200 the first day, not thinking anything of it. I figured I spend some of it and then pay it back before month end to build my credit. On the 2nd day my CC was declined. When I called them they told me there is a hold on the credit card and I have to pay $600 right away to get the hold removed. They couldn't even wait until month end for the payment. That didn't make sense. The rep. said they were afraid I will spend everything and not pay back. So I asked, then why didn't they just approve me for $1500 and we wouldn't have this problem. Even when I make a payment, now if I ever use it again, I will be thinking will it go through or not. I never had this problem with any other CC before. Would not recommend it to anybody!!!

I was offered PC MasterCard couple of years ago, was given $10000.00 limit on the card, at some point this years I asked to have convenient cheque to pay for renovation in my house, suddenly PC blocked my account for no reason!!! Then when I called they said we need proof of residence and driver's license. I told you could call me and explain why the block. They said they did call, I asked what number, apparently they were lying they had no number to call. After numerous calls again they stated my card, yesterday again this time reduced my credit limit by 7500 dollars, again no reason, truly garbage credit card and extremely bad customer service.

This company offers you a credit card and then cancels it for no reason. Even when your payments are current and not at limit? Poor customer service when asking for explanations. Feel like it's a money grab for their company. They approve everyone then cancel the cards and ensure you pay the entire balance off before you are allowed to apply again. Pretty good way to increase their company face value. Gets the financial world thinking everyone is moving to PC Financial. They should be worried about their back end and retention from the fall out of cancelled cards. May not catch up to them today...but it will. Watch your PC Products. They won't be on top for long, not after this type of discredit starts surfacing.

Due to unforeseen circumstances such as a car accident and job loss, PC Financial CHOSE to cancel my Mastercard even though I paid the balance owing in full. I have no problem admitting that I was late a few times with payments and went over my credit limit due to the car accident insurance deductible, I feel strongly that I should have been given credit for paying the balance in full of $810.

I have my PC MasterCard since 2017 with no issue then one day in April 2018 I discovered that my credit limit had been decreased from $2000 to $1600. Called the customer service and I was told that I had 3 overlimits for the past 2 months. Why they decreased my limit which I don’t see on my statements. So, in May 2018, I started paying twice a month totaling $550 and June 5 I paid $600 to avoid overlimit as they claim. At the end of the day I let it go and moved on. Then today, June 24, 2018, PC Financial reduced my limit again from $1600 to $1100 even though I had not defaulted on my payment obligations.

I have had months of fraudulent charges on my card. I tried to cancel so the charges would stop. They told me this would do nothing. I opened up a dispute, followed everything they said, and provided proof and they still said I lost the dispute. The customer service is a joke. Every rep didn't seem to know what they are doing. They did barely anything to help. They are one of the worst banks I've ever dealt with. Avoid them at all costs.

This company is a joke. I have always been a good paymaster with all my credit cards but never encounter such BS and hassle for having this credit card. I had gotten a supplemental card for my son for emergency usage. Yes he used it and forgot to tell me about it. This happened in July of 2017 hence since I did not know about it and had not received any statements or calls from PC Financial therefore had no idea I had owed them any money. By the way it was $65.55. Only last month I was using their card for making a purchase and was declined. I could not log in my online account and finally called their customer service. They reassured me no problem, after making payment everything will be taken care of.

Have to say that of all the banks I've ever applied for credit this is easily the worst and most tedious in which to obtain anything. If you've recently moved or less than a year at your current address you can expect these guys to demand all sorts of documentation from utility bills to personal cheques for $1 to CRA income statements and besides the cheque, they insist on 'original' documents as if they were the passport office.

I’ve been a customer for quite some time and have always paid on time. Recently one of my dogs got really sick and had to pay higher bills than normal and got me behind in payments. Called customer services a couple of months ago to let them know and the guy said not to worry when I explained the situation and the reason I was behind. Since then I’ve been getting nonstop calls from them and even though I explain again and again the situation and they agreed to stop the calls I keep getting a call a day.

We are two seniors enjoying a winter in a beautiful Mexican town called Guanajuato. We like to put our groceries on our credit card but imagine our shock when our President's Choice Mastercard was returned to us with a "declined" message. I called the customer service line and was told that our account had been cancelled because they had sent out new cards in November and they had never been activated. But I had called customer service while we were still in Canada and told them that I was not going to activate the cards until we got back in March because I had pending reservations on my current card. She said that was fine.

After being a loyal customer for 2 years they closed my account for no reason and this happened 2 days before the Christmas. I was never late for any payments. They basically tricked me saying send us your Identification and a statement copy then they closed my account. Anyone who has an account with PC Financial, don't trust them as they can let you down when you need them and my advice to you, never send anyone any documents as it's just a trap, just like what happened to me. They closed my account after they got the Documents. I would never deal with them ever again.

I'm having a major issue with PC Financial, and I'm thinking it must be because of their recent change in ownership. I've been a customer of theirs since 2000 and haven't ever had this problem. I expect my mortgage payment to be paid by them every 2 weeks always on Friday night. On Saturday it didn't get paid, so I put a bit more money in my account. On Monday night I put in some more money to pay a credit card bill, and realized I put in too much, so I selected the option on the ATM to withdraw a bit. The ATM told me that I didn't have an account to withdraw money. I figured that the computer might be in software upgrade mode due to CIBC taking over PC Financial and went home.

This card is horrible. I can't withdraw money under 1000 dollars and I paid my bill. I checked the next day and the payment went from 321.74 to 374.74. They also stated to me that I would have 349.50 for my available balance when the payment came through. I got 258 dollars and my remaining balance was 114 dollars. I don't recommend anyone for this company.

PC Financial, I am appalled for the third time this year at how you have been handling my money. I have been trying to rebuild my house that burnt down in a wild fire and all your company has done is put up road blocks, shown constant incompetence and treated me without respect. We are about to move into our rebuild in three weeks and again I have to chase down your senior investigator to do her job and escalate it to the supervisor when she does not respond to me.

I applied to renew my mortgage In April 2017. After providing all the documents outlined President's Choice demanded that I provide them with a letter indicating that I was no longer on probation at my employment. My employer stated that current pay stub was prove of continuous employment. I have banked with PC since 2004 and have their Optimum MasterCard so they know my financial history and for them to use such a trivial reason. I am parting ways, I have nothing to fear, I will still get a mortgage elsewhere because I have a job and an excellent credit. Bye.

I never wanted a PC MasterCard but got convinced by one of their salespeople in the store to get one. As we do quite a bit of shopping at Fortinos and were told that this would help us earn points towards groceries faster, I signed up. Had the card for a few years with no issue then one day I discovered that my credit limit had been decreased. I called the customer service and was told that something must have negatively affected my credit score which would have caused the decrease in the credit limit. I am a monthly subscriber of Equifax so knew right away that the reason they gave me was a lie and when I told them as much I was told that in any event, the terms of the credit card allow PC Financial to reduce the credit limit for no reason at all.

They are not easy to deal with at all, it is the most difficult financial institution. I cancelled my Mastercard with them a while back and I am not cancelling my wife's as well. For having a credit card that does not have any annual fee, customers does not deserve the kinda treatment that they give. I thought Scotiabank was bad, but these guys are worst.

The tactics of this bank are truly beyond words. I thought I would switch over to PC from a much larger bank which charges fees. After selling my house, I deposited a certified cheque from my lawyer on the 27th of the month. Believing a certified cheque is the same as cash I wrote a cheque for some plumbing work shortly after that, which bounced. After calling repeatedly, and trying every approach from anger, to pleading with them because my family had no furniture to sit on (we sold most of our furniture with the previous house), I was met with nothing but apathy and rudeness. I have NEVER, EVER been treated so poorly by a company in my life. They truly do not care at all about your business. They are rude and unconcerned about anything you say.

Worst experience ever with PC Financial Master Card. I called this morning to help my dad reset his PIN. At the beginning of the call, I advised the lady that I'm the primary card holder and my dad doesn't speak English well, so I'm going to put him on speak phone and help to translate. The lady asked my dad his name, date of birth, the phone number associated with the account, and how old is he as of today, and my dad answer all of them in ENGLISH. And then she asked my dad the email address on the account and if he's working. I told her that I'm the primary account holder and that's my email address; then I said again my dad doesn't speak English very well and she has already asked him 4 security questions and he answered all of them in ENGLISH. The lady asked me to write down the email address and have my dad repeat that information. Excuse me?? That's how PC Financial authorize their client????

My monthly payments from Metro Toronto social services was debited on April 28, 2017 on Friday in my checking account of PC Financial. As the office knows that my mortgage and other payments to be made on every 1st of the month and the bank released the amount on 2nd May 2017 without caring. Even after calling and spoke to one of the supervisor that my mortgage payment and some of my other payments has to be made on every 1st day of the month I went through a mental trauma after realising their insensitivity and carelessness towards customer that even after calling and pleading they did not cared and released the amount in my account only on 2nd May 2017.

We have tried to get a line of credit through this bank thinking that the no fee bank account along with free groceries would be a good idea! NOT the case! They have no idea what they are doing! Are very disorganised! And the sales people we talk to are clueless. I rather pay for a bank that knows what the hell they are doing. Worst bank experience of my life!

The company was promoting membership sales at Loblaw's and I signed up for the mastercard. They did a credit search on the spot and gave me a $10k limit. Six months later I received a letter from them stating the limit was lowered to $500. This was clearly a "con job" to get me signed up for their product as my balance on the card for 90% of the 6 month period was $0. When I called to get it changed back they would not budge so I cancelled my card on the spot and I will never use another PC Financial product again.

If you obtain a loan from PC Financial, keep a very close eye on your credit report and score. I had a small 5-year installment loan of $5000 that I paid off early. I then confirmed that the account had zero balance and was in the clear. A few months later, they updated Equifax to say that I have missed 3 payments and had an outstanding amount of $4.00 overdue for 90 days. That took about 150 points off my Equifax credit score. I know free banking is attractive, but for your financial security's sake - stay away from this firm. They conduct business in a fraudulent manner.

Thanks to your idiotic employee my checks are floating around God only knows where. When I opened the account, I gave your male employee at the Zehrs the correct address information. Yet he chose not to input the information in correctly. So when I ordered checks they were sent to an address in Welland that is not where I live. I live in Niagara Falls, Ontario. To make matters worse your company refuses to fix the issue or change my account information without running a credit check on me. So basically someone in Welland has my checks and banking info and there's nothing I can do about it. I am so not impressed with this bank right now!!

This has been the worst banking experience of my entire life. CIBC and President’s Choice are banks that do not care about current or previous account holders. They do not care about their customers. They only see dollars and cents not people. They claim that they scheduled to close my account on September 21. They did not close the account until November 14. During that time they did not send me a letter. They call. They did not give me any opportunity to withdraw the money. What they did was they all close the account. They took all the money. They told me they put it on the check and they told me that the check would be mailed out to me. They also told me I would have to wait 5 to 7 business days to receive the check. They did not send a check by a rush order mail delivery. They did not send the check in the secure manner to which I would have to sign for it. They did none of that.

My recent order of cheque books was intercepted and used by an unknown individual who was able to withdraw some thousands of dollars from my account. I contacted PC Financial, who assured me that the funds would be returned and that no more cheques would go through as they would put a "stop" on my account. A couple days later I was reviewing my account and noticed I did receive the reimbursement from the bank but that another cheque was processed by an unknown individual. When I contacted PC Financial again to ask why another cheque had gone through they weren't able to give an explanation. I then asked when would I receive another reimbursement for this blunder and I was told a few business days.

This is just to caution people to get full disclosure about what conditions will be placed on a PC loan. We went into a PC Pavilion as long-time customers with zero debt asking for a line of credit secured against our paid-off home. We went through five different people/departments and asked in good faith upfront at every step if we could use the loan to renovate our house and to create a rental suite. After many meetings and phone calls, the final document still contained clauses that disallowed renovations or rentals without the bank's written approval.

Getting a mortgage with PC bank was worse than pulling teeth! Our mortgage specials never answered his phone or replied to my emails. He never cc-ed my girlfriend (who was also on the mortgage), on any correspondence. They did not send paperwork to my lawyer until THE DAY OF OUR CLOSING despite the fact that I reminded my mortgage specialist every day for a week leading up to the closing day that the closing was coming up. As a result we were not able to close that day and incurred penalties. Finally the mortgage rate they ended up giving us was higher than the one we originally agreed on. I brought this to the attention of my mortgage specialist. It has now been over 2 weeks and our rate is still wrong (we will be making our first payment today). Absolutely terrible experience, will never use them again.

Worst customer service. Had issue with my auto insurance, the way they dealt with it was horrible. Called back a couple days ago and how they communicate with me was as bad as before. The lady on the phone even lied: stating I had multiple conflicting address on file but I only had one address. When asked for the reason of my cancellation (I called in twice), both agents refused to tell me, just stating it was cancelled (I'm not sure if this is a company policy). Finally received my cancellation letter and it says I gave false information, and breach of contract (someone else drive my car). Which did not make sense at all. I have been living alone for years. Feeling extremely helpless now, it's going to be on my record for 5 years. I wish I could find a way to resolve this but it takes at least 30 min wait everything I try to call them. Very disappointed.

There's a TONNE of fine print, but read it ALL folks!!! After accidentally ordering the incorrect model of an item, and immediately correcting the order, a hold was nevertheless put on a large sum on my PC MasterCard by the vendor for the original order. Vendor issued a number to prove first transaction was cancelled, but PC would not accept this from me as it apparently needed to come from Vendor. Vendor tried, but could not get through to PC to provide this number. Pended transaction caused account to go over limit when valid transaction was processed, then guess what??? PC raised my annual rate of interest to 25.95% on the full balance! (Held account for three years, with no missed or late payments).

Some money was debited from my account in error. I spotted the error and immediately paid cash in to correct the mistake as my mortgage was coming out in two days. Unfortunately cash takes three days to clear, yes CASH. My mortgage bounced and now I have a lovely $80 penalty to pay. The service in the bank was poor, they basically just shrugged their shoulders. I have banked in both the UK and Canada and have never experienced such a shabby service. Don't be fooled when you sign up for so-called "free" banking, you will pay more fees and penalties than you would with a $15 a month account. This however would be a good account for a child to have until reach an age where they are slightly more serious about banking.

I have never had a worse experience with a bank in all of Canada and USA until this: I sent my NEW landlord rent by Interact E - Transfer thru PC Financial online banking days ago! My receiver correctly answered the security question / password and it was accepted, but the money did not go into her account. She just kept getting an error. She called PC Bank and spent 2 hours back and forth, with the reps blaming me, blaming her (Saying she isn't doing it correctly) and then making up other ridiculous excuses. I called several times and got different excuses and that they were going to escalate the issue to their security department. I tried reclaiming the transfer and it wouldn't work. They told me it won't until the department lifts the block. I did everything correctly with the transaction and so did the receiver, but PC bank screwed everything up.

My sister passed away in May 2014 and as the executor of her will I contacted all the appropriate financial banks/institutions that she was involved with. PC Financial was the first. They sent me a letter of instructions listing the required documentation (original copies of death certificate, will, Letter of Direction, signed copy of Declaration of and indicating that I could bring it to one of their in-store pavilions), which I did in a matter of a few weeks. The agent took the documentation and said all would be fine. Not hearing anything from them I called their Customer Service in July who did not have the documentation. I spoke to a Supervisor who indicated they were reviewing the matter.

I switched banking to PC Financial a few years ago because of the no fee banking. If you want to transfer money from one account to the other it takes 24 hours. When you call them, you're on hold for a long time. They would not let me wire money to my family in another country. They are stingy with credit card increases. They have far too much control over my money. Not the best way to bank. I've gone back to a regular bank where I can do what I want, when I want.

I mistakenly sent $7800 to my wife's private PC MasterCard. After noticing the mistake a few days later, I called her PCMC account and asked them to transfer the money back. They said they couldn't, and I would have to call my PC Bank for a charge reversal. I called my PC Bank and was told they would do it and it would take 3-4 weeks. (This was borrowed money I would pay interest on!) After 4 weeks and no reversal, I called my bank and they told me they hadn't heard from PC MasterCard. They sent another reversal to PCMC and said to call back in a week.

Beware! I recently booked some airline tickets with a company and charged it on President's Choice master card but had a transaction declined through no fault of my own. The transaction showed approved on my end. The PC Master card security dept systems, not a human, saw the purchase as fraud and declined it later but not when the purchase was made. This travel purchase was tied into another and when we found out about the problem we requested to cancel all the purchases but were told we would have to speak to a supervisor. Someone would call in 15-30 minutes but no more than an hour for sure.

I want my husband to show active on our mortgage. I already made the change with land titles. I find it unbelievable that they will not change it. I am not paying or doing out paperwork to make changes that are already made. I have faxed in a copy of the new land title. I don't know why something so simple has to be complicated. Why should I pay $150 more in fees or do more paperwork? They have caused me nothing but stress and frustration. I wish I never switched my mortgage with them. It has been a nightmare experience!

I recently refinanced my property and left PC Financial to go with FirstLine Mortgages. My early closure fee was stated to be $3,775.29 and I acted on that, being that the numbers stacked up to bring me to a favorable outcome. So I called them on the 9th December 2010, obtained the above information and closed on the 15th December 2010. The figure above was given to be effective until 1st January 2011. So all was fine, just that everything was subject to change.

I had home and auto insurance with PC. My auto insurance increased (March 16th 2010) and I was told that in May 2010 when my home Insurance is due for renewal my auto will reduce by 15%. In April 2010, I received a letter from PC indicating an increase of my home insurance as well. Upon inquiring, I was told that PC couldn't get a better price. So I decided to cancel both my auto and home insurance with PC effective on May 16th and was told I will be refunded $61.00 (I paid PC $259/month auto insurance). Instead, I cancelled the insurance on April 21st 2010 and was assured that I will be given a refund in excess of $200 but this didn't happen, PC instead give me the $61.00 only. After complaining, the agent said he will speak to his manager and get back to me. He didn't so I called and was told that I was charged for 4 days insurance and cancellation fee amounting to $198.00 in total. This is blatant robbery. Can something be done about this? $198.00 out of $259 is too much for a cancellation fee. Thank you so much.