Reader Says Barclaycard Wrongly Linked Them to Another Customer's Account for a Year

A reader has reported to The Guardian's Money section that Barclaycard has been sending them communications tied to a credit card account they say they never applied for, with the issue persisting for roughly a year despite multiple attempts to resolve it.

According to the account given to The Guardian, the reader received an email approximately a year ago stating that their "application was successful" for a Barclaycard credit card. The reader said they had made no such application.

The reader said they immediately reported the email to Barclaycard and subsequently made repeated phone calls to the company's customer service department after receiving further emails related to the account. During these contacts, the reader said Barclaycard representatives assured them the issue was the result of a simple typographical error rather than fraudulent activity, and that the reader's email address would be removed from the account in question.

Despite these assurances, the reader said they are now receiving notifications indicating that a payment on the account is overdue, suggesting the email address had not been disassociated from the account as promised.

The Guardian's report does not indicate what response, if any, Barclaycard has provided regarding the overdue payment notifications or whether the underlying account issue has since been resolved. The Guardian's Money section regularly publishes consumer complaints submitted by readers regarding disputes with financial institutions and other companies.

Barclaycard has not been quoted directly in the material provided, and further comment from the company on this specific case was not included in the source material reviewed.