19/08/2010
By ninemsn Money staff
The ANZ has agreed to wipe $18,600 in debt from a Victorian pensioner's credit card after steadily increasing his limit over the past nine years.
Alec Stubbs, a former wharfie from Yarawonga, has had his ANZ credit card limit increased to $46,000 since 1991.
"It's clear this customer's credit limit should not have been increased to this extent, and due to the exceptional circumstances we have decided to clear this debt to ensure his family is not placed under any additional stress at this time," ANZ spokesperson Stephen Ries told the Herald Sun.
Stubbs, 72, has been on a pension for several years and receives $485 a fortnight.
He also had a credit card with the Commonwealth Bank with the limit steadily climbed from $3,500 in 2003 to $25,000 in 2006.
CBA spokesperson Steve Batten said the bank had stopped unsolicited offers to welfare recipients from 2007, and those who requested extra credit had to pass a financial test according to the Herald Sun.
Stubbs’ wife Pauline only discovered that her husband was $36,000 in debt when she opened his mail while he was in hospital being treated for cancer.
"I nearly died," she said. "How in the hell could they think a pensioner could really afford this? We are not secret millionaires.
"Even if he asked for this, don't they check into people's circumstances before they throw money around?"
The husband and wife have kept separate banks accounts throughout their 53-year marriage and she wasn't aware of the minimum monthly payments running into hundreds of dollars.
His deteriorating health and confusion has left him unable to properly explain his finances according to the Herald Sun.
In August the federal government promised new measures that would mean credit card companies would not be allowed to increase credit limits without agreement from customers .
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