Back in mid-December, 2023 I received a tax refund from CTR of over $1,100 for which I had to pay a fee of approximately 33%, which worked out to be around $350, leaving a net tax refund of around $750.
However, despite opting to have the service fee debited automatically from my bank account via pre-authorized debit (PAD), I received an e-mail from CTR stating "Your Service Fee is overdue" so I ended up sending an e-transfer of the service fee to this company. But lo-and-behold, the very next day I noticed that the same fee WAS automatically debited from my account despite the notice! So I immediately contacted the Billing dep't to advise them of what happened. The agent I spoke with acknowledged their mistake and stated that they would have this corrected. She also stated that their support team would also make some changes in order to ensure that customers who have opted for PAD are not sent a so-called "Payment Overdue" e-mail unless the account is NSF (which did not occur in my case).
But one other thing that the agent informed me was that it normally takes between 60-90 days in order to receive a payment reversal from the Billing dep't as per some sort of policy, which I think is rather atrocious! I then voiced my concerns to the agent and stated to her that the double-payment was partly due to an issue with their notification system. The agent agreed with the issue and stated she would have this correction expedited back in early-January of this year. However, to this day, I STILL have not received the refund correction and so now an extra $350 that does not belong to this company is still outstanding and sitting in their pocket!
Worse yet, it has been OVER 90 DAYS since I brought all this to their attention! As a result, I was in touch with Billing last week about this and the agent I spoke with said "I will send this over to my manager" but so far, no response. So I called them back about 1 hour ago and spoke with the same agent, who stated she was aware of this but still has not heard back from the manager!
I am therefore suspecting that there may be a certain degree of criminal neglegence taking place at this company and am therefore reqeusting a thorough investigtion take place.
Whatever you folks can do would greatly be appreciated!
Claimed loss: Over $350.
Desired outcome: Full refund, apology and change in their policies for billing corrections made as a result of issues that are not entirely the fault of the customer.
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UPDATE: The exact amount that CTR still owes me is $386.22.
Okay, so far it has been 2 weeks and STILL no refund correction! I called the Billing department one week ago today (Wednesday) and the agent stated that she would send an e-mail to the refund agents and have this request expedited. Still no word back and no money as of today and so I called back the same department and spoke with an agent, only for her to state the SAME thing I was told last week--that this would be expedited!
So I then told the agent that I will be opening a dispute with my bank if I do not see money back in my account by this-coming Friday.
But overall as of this-past Monday, CTR is no longer authorized to handle my taxes! I have since contacted the CRA to have CTR removed and blocked from all authorization and have just signed on with a more popular and reputable company who also charges no greater than 15% in fees. So far, the agent that I have spoken to seemed highly-determined to help me with my taxes to the best of her abilities!
I was finally able to resolve the issue via Miriam from the Refunds team, who went out of her way to do what the Billing team would not do and that is issue my refund correction on the same day! Although I thank Miriam for her attention to this matter, this will not change my views on the way this company operates!