Auto-pay with my credit card. This should be a recurring bill.

[bethgreen]

I already set up Auto-pay with my credit card. This should be a recurring bill. But my credit card doesn't receive as a recurring bill. After talking to the representative from the credit card company, the suggestion is that I have to ask public mobile.

What merchandise code do public mobile use for charging my credit card? How to make it work so it'll appear as recurring bill not for one time bill? Thank you

Already message the  Moderator_Team  but no reply

[hTideGnow]

Hi @ChanPatr yes, PM Pre-authorized payments does not consider as recurring and hence won't earn you any of those recurring bonus

As the parking garage, it is wrong with the merchant name on credit card.  Weird and not sure why not changed after so many years

[ChanPatr]

It looks like Public Mobile isn't using a merchant code to indicate it is a recurring bill. I noticed it on my credit card statement as well. 

Credit card classifies the Public Mobile charge under "Communications, Telecommunications Equipment" category but named as a "Public Parking Garage" ... 🤣

Since I can't take advantage of the cashback multiplier, I switched out from using a cashback credit card to a travel rewards credit card.

[darlicious]

@Homeground @bethgreen 

A better choice for a card would be a koho card. This online bank has a high interest savings account (2.5% i think) charges no fees for the their regular visa/debit card and you recieve a minimum 0.5% cashback on all purchases and an additional 2% (2.5% total+) when paying for your public mobile renewal and/or top ups and add ons. Additional 1% cashback "credits" can be earned by being referred or giving referrals (up to a max.13.5% for 90 days). It only takes 5 min to sign up (choose savings) and about 5 business days to recieve your koho card in the mail.

If this strikes your fancy private message me and I will send you a list of members who are koho clients that you can pm for a referral code. I'll put you on my list if you become a client.

[bethgreen]

thanks for sharing your experience. I totally agree with you

[darlicious]

@Homeground 

In all likelyhood the reason pm has not chosen to change the merchant code for its billing is that the recurring payment code charges a higher percentage fee. Since pm is a low cost carrier that also has a lower income customer profile that tend not to have "premium" credit cards at their disposal if any card at all means to change the code to please a few customers while not benefiting the majority would incur additional costs that would have to be recovered through price increases. The other providers that have this merchant code have the ability and make use of raising prices or charging extra fees. Public mobile does not charge extra fees and grandfathers plan prices when plans change without requiring a 2 year commitment. Lower prices for all of pm's customers is better than a few of  their customers saving up to an extra 4% on their cashback cards. There other ways to save on your bill......take advantage of them to make up for the 4% you are "losing" from your card.

[Homeground]

I agree 100% with the OP. The "solutions" provided to date make it look like PM has little to do with the problem. In fact, the issue lies squarely with PM, not with us customers. To date PM either doesn't know to code it's auto-pays as a recurring credit card payment, or has chosen not to. My Bell landline bill gets me 4% cashback on my credit card auto-pay, as does my Rogers cable TV. Both amounts have a fixed base amount, but also fluctuate from time to time if I buy an extra within a month (e,g., a long-distance call or an on-demand movie). So, there is nothing different about those two services and PM's with regard to billing. On this subject, my credit card terms & conditions state:

Recurring bill payments are defined as payments made on a monthly or regular basis automatically billed by the merchant to your ____ ____ card. Recurring Bill Payments are typically for telecommunication, insurance, membership, subscription payments, etc. Not all merchants offer recurring bill payments (please check with your merchant to see if they offer recurring bill payments on ________ cards).

If a PM client happiness rep reads this, please escalate this as a formal complaint to your billing department, and ask them to align PM with its industry peers in providing this useful service. Many or most of us who get a cashback reward for recurring payments actually pay an annual credit card fee for this feature, so it is really irritating not to receive rewards to which we are entitled, but denied due to the merchant's billing decision.

I have another card that gives extra cashback reward at restaurants and bars, and simply stopped patronizing one restaurant who brushed me off when I suggested he change his merchant code from "catering service" (no extra cashback) to the code for"restaurant". So merchants need to be a bit more careful about being too cavalier with their credit card merchant coding setups.

There's also no point speculating that the issue lies with at the OP's end, or imply that s/he should just suck it up. This is an easy fix for Public Mobile to enact if it has the will to do so. If PM does, it will remove an irritant from what is otherwise a very positive customer experience. Kudos to you @bethgreen for kickstarting this issue. Cheers👏

[bethgreen]

/yes. it's already set up as auto pay.

[popping]

@bethgreen 

PM does not setup to accept payment like a bank bill payment.

You need to setup autopay from a credit card or Visa debit card payment on your self-serve account so that PM server will take money from your credit card or your Visa debit card on your renewal date.

[darlicious]

@bethgreen 

Public mobile does not have themselves coded for recurring bill status. At this time there are no plans to change this. You can look into other options to recieve cash back percentages on your public mobile bill payments. For example koho and public mobile have an arrangement to recieve an extra 2% on top of the regular 0.5% on the basic koho card.( A referral to koho will add 1% to the base rate and any additional referrals you make add 1% to your base rate up to a maximum 13.5% cashback rate for your first 3 months.)

[Anonymous]

 @bethgreen 

This is not a "recurring bill" compatible place. I think it has to do with the fact that the payment date floats up due to it being 30 days. Other recurring bills would be monthly. Which would mean the "same" day.

[hairbag1 · Accepted solution]

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@bethgreen wrote:

I already set up Auto-pay with my credit card. This should be a recurring bill. But my credit card doesn't receive as a recurring bill. After talking to the representative from the credit card company, the suggestion is that I have to ask public mobile.

What merchandise code do public mobile use for charging my credit card? How to make it work so it'll appear as recurring bill not for one time bill? Thank you

Already message the  Moderator_Team  but no reply

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Your PM account isn't a "recurring bill" but will simply be a debit from your on file credit card or Visa debit.

You also have the option to pay manually with your credit card, a retail voucher or an on-line voucher.

[JoyLuck]

@bethgreen 

Even though your credit card is on file you still need to enable autopay. Has that been done?

[Triguy]

Sometimes autopay fails.  You could try removing and adding back your credit card.

To set up AutoPay, sign in to your Self-Serve account, select the ‘Payment’ tab, then ‘Register for AutoPay’. From here, you can sign up for AutoPay or remove the feature, if you no longer want payments to automatically occur. If you would like to change the card that is automatically charged, scroll to the bottom of the ‘Payment’ tab, then select ‘Manage my card’. This will allow you to update or remove your credit or Visa Debit card.