Man who created own credit card sues bank for not sticking to terms - Brilliant!

Originally posted by CookieMonster09

To continue calling him a criminal while being unable to cite the law that was violated is even more ridiculous.

Credit card fraud.

Hmmmm....."credit card fraud"

Credit card fraud is a wide-ranging term for theft and fraud committed using a credit card or any similar payment mechanism as a fraudulent source of funds in a transaction.

I will take that to mean that you don't know a valid answer.

At least in the U.S., it's a one way contract. There is no "negotiation" of terms. The credit card company says, "These are our terms." The borrower either agrees, or doesn't get the credit card. The borrower can't doctor the contract under false pretenses.

In this case, he took the existing contract, scanned it into his computer, then doctored the contract. It's pretty clear cut that this doctoring of the contract was an act of deception, and not an ongoing "negotiation" between two parties.

edit on 13-8-2013 by CookieMonster09 because: (no reason given)

If the contract states as much, then you are correct. If it does not, then you are not correct.

Like I mentioned, a vendor sent me a .pdf contract that was not the terms we had agreed to, and was full of typo's. We converted it to .doc, corrected the terms, corrected the typo's, and sent it back signed. They did not dispute. They did not say anything. They didn't proof read the contract, as they admitted. And were under the belief that the other terms were in effect. But we did nothing wrong. We just amended the contract and returned it to them, which they accepted. No arguments came of this, no hard feelings. THey are working with us on other projects in the future as well.

We did not attempt to deceive them, and they did not feel deceived.

I will take that to mean that you don't know a valid answer.

No. You just chose to ignore my answer. Credit card fraud is against the law in most modern countries. Good grief.

Like I mentioned, a vendor sent me a .pdf contract that was not the terms we had agreed to, and was full of typo's.

Different scenario. This was not a vendor relationship. This was a credit card company and a borrower operating under an invalid contract.

There is no "consideration" for the credit card company to issue a 0% interest rate credit card, so the contract is not valid. To have consideration, the contract would have to show some kind of value or benefit for the credit card company. Since it did not, the contract is invalid.

Consideration is a pretty basic fundamental concept in contract law.

reply to post by CookieMonster09


Yes, credit card fraud is against the law.

What this gentleman did is not defined as "credit card fraud" under any legal authority I am aware of. I am asking you to provide evdience to the contrary.

"Credit card fraud" is not a law.

I still think the bank has outs in this one. They can still uphold tampering with their original contract or throw it on reason-ability of the contract. Contracts with absurd demands can be pleaded as being unlawful despite of having been signed.

In the end however it depends on the judge his mood en mindset. The bank will bring in top lawyers and ultimately the judge will most likely cut the guy some slack but still allow the bank to weasel out of it. Forcing the bank to pay 'an amount' for the mistake and at the same time declaring the contract void due to it being unreasonable in its demands.

This will raise questions about demands of contracts in general but in the end will make banks even more impossible to deal with. The case gives me a chuckle but its not like I'm not seeing the truth of matters; this will not matter in the least on the crippling grip the banks have on our daily lives.

A contract is a contract regardless on what corporation or individual puts in it. If it's signed by both parties (and witness when necessary) the contract is valid until both parties mutually void the contract or it is broken by one of the parties. The penalty for breaking a contract is included in the contract, otherwise there wouldn't be a need for a contract.

The Bank had to go over it, sign it, and input the data in the database manually and provide the approved credit card. There's no such thing as a one-way contract, it's ALWAYS a two-party (or more) contract. The customer signs the contract first, and the bank signs it second and once the contracts are signed and dated, it becomes valid by the terms that was agreed within the contract.

Should the contract be broken and the consequences aren't met, such as paying a fee for breaking the contract. Then the party that did not break the contract can bring the other to a civil court to sue for the amount that is owed. In this scenario, the bank is at fault and made a mistake which they can't fix without paying out of pocket for. They screw their customers with fine print all the time, but it's legal practice. What this guy did was also legal practice, at least in theory.

I'm not a lawyer or an expert in this field, but that's basically what I know about the law and it may not necessarily reflect the craziness that's happening with big banks.

reply to post by predator0187


OMG! This is brilliant!!! That guy is a hero!

What this gentleman did is not defined as "credit card fraud" under any legal authority I am aware of. I am asking you to provide evdience to the contrary.

Thou shalt not steal. What this gentleman did is doctor a legal contract so he could garner unlimited access to interest-free money. The contract is invalid because there is no "consideration", as I have described above.

For a legal contract to be valid, there has to be value or benefit to both parties. In this case, this is a one-way contract written entirely to the benefit of the borrower, and said contract was doctored by the borrower. The credit card company "accepted" the contract under the premise that the contract was not doctored in any way.

It's no different than changing the interest rate on your mortgage loan with a pen and paper when the title attorney happens to look the other way and not pay attention. Same concept. You could never get away with doing this at a real estate closing, and you certainly cannot legally tamper with a credit card contract and not expect repercussions.

For unsecured debt, such as credit cards, the bank has no collateral. That is why interest rates on most credit cards can run anywhere from 20% or higher. The credit card company could never function by borrowing funds from a traditional bank and then lending those funds as unsecured debt to borrowers at 0%. This case is a perfect example -- In the end, the borrower stiffed the credit card company.

"Credit card fraud" is not a law.

Laws against theft are as old as the Ten Commandments. While I am not Russian, I am fairly certain that they would have laws against doctoring legal contracts and outright theft.

Contracts with absurd demands can be pleaded as being unlawful despite of having been signed.

Bingo.

There's no such thing as a one-way contract, it's ALWAYS a two-party (or more) contract.

With most credit cards, you sign an application, which has a whole lot of legal verbiage in it. Once the application is approved, they mail you the card along with the fine print legal contract. It's a one way contract, and not a negotiable instrument.

I'm not a lawyer or an expert in this field, but that's basically what I know about the law and it may not necessarily reflect the craziness that's happening with big banks.

..or rather, the criminality of credit card borrowers. After all, the loser in this scenario is the credit card company, not the borrower. At least thus far, until this matter is settled in court, the credit card company lost money, not the borrower.

reply to post by CookieMonster09



It wasn't doctored, it was modified.

You are correct in that they can "get out of it". However, it does not appear that Russian law is supportive of that notion.

reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan


Well; outside the issue that the contract is not considerate and would therefor be declared void in the US. This is Russia; Poetin will personally torpedo this contract because having a bank being drained by a single regular individual would be potentially harmful to the economy. Remember; Russia doesn't have to play democratic as long as you have the government to back you up. That said; the US would weasel out of such a legal contract simularly but less plain in view like.

Case in point:

Man Who 'Hijacked' Bank's Fine Print to Flee Russia 12 August 2013 |
Issue 5188 RIA Novosti

A man who tricked a bank into signing a credit deal under his conditions, buried in the fine print, said he would leave the country after receiving what he called threats from the bank’s owner. Dmitry Agarkov, who lives in the city of Voronezh in southern Russia, pulled his trick in 2008, when he received a credit card from the Tinkoff Credit Systems bank, media reported this week. The procedure required Agarkov to fill in an electronic application form and send it to the bank, which was then to print it out and sign and stamp the document, sealing the deal. What Agarkov did was send back a tweaked form with his own fine print, he told RIA Voronezh news agency. The new deal removed all commissions and put the annual interest rate at zero percent instead of 45 percent in the bank’s original offer, the report said. It also set up huge fines in case the bank canceled or violated the deal. Agarkov told Slon.ru news website on Friday that he never expected the deal to go through, but six months later, he actually received a card issued under his conditions, apparently because bank clerks did not read the fine print in the application they received from him.

The bank annulled the card over missed payments in 2010 and later sued him for 45,000 rubles ($1,400) but was hit back with a 24-million-ruble ($730,000) claim based on Agarkov’s version of the agreement. After the story first made headlines earlier this week, the bank’s outspoken owner, Oleg Tinkov – who made a Forbes list of most eccentric Russian businessmen in 2011 – said on Twitter that Agarkov “will get four years for fraud, not 24 million.” “I’m out of the Russian Federation starting today,” Agarkov, a sales manager in a firm selling construction pipes, told Slon.ru, commenting on Tinkov’s statement. He added that Tinkov specifying an exact jail term could imply the banker used his connections to ensure a guilty verdict for the client. Read more: www.themoscowtimes.com... The Moscow Times

Seems Like Dimitri is running for his life since he might get prison or simply right out get killed. The man will never see his money and the system wins again.

reply to post by AncientShade


Well.....

Originally posted by White Locust
Funny and all, but I hope he has money for lawyers if he expects a fight.

People talk about getting a patent to protect intellectual property, but it is very expensive to enforce a patent! I do give this guy credit for creativity but the bank will win unless this guy has money to burn.

I don't believe you have grasped what Dmitry Argarkov has managed to do here, and what that allows him to do.

It wasn't doctored, it was modified.

Oh, yes, and what a "modification" it was. So much so that it will cost him his citizenship as he flees the country.

Seems Like Dimitri is running for his life since he might get prison or simply right out get killed. The man will never see his money and the system wins again.

The borrower is always servant to the lender.

If you tried this in the US, you'd end up in prison for fraud.
Forging, counterfeiting, or altering a credit application is seriously illegal, and you'll do some hard prison time for it.

hahaha Love it!!

The banks are such money hoarding, money making, demons from hell.


Slightly depressing that our gov't is so damn poor because of credit bureaus, and that if everyone in the states paid their part of gov't debt - it'd be close to 50k. And rising.

Sad day in whoville.

Originally posted by defcon5
If you tried this in the US, you'd end up in prison for fraud.
Forging, counterfeiting, or altering a credit application is seriously illegal, and you'll do some hard prison time for it.

Yep. Without a second glance and all of those that never thought about - half would be glad to see you rot and the rest would support you but only in theory. Few would actually stand up for the guy.

IMHO, I believe that the first judge screwed up here. A credit application is an application, not a contract. Its the bank soliciting you, stating, “these are our terms, if you agree to them you may apply”. Sending back the application in itself should be considered implied acceptance of the original terms, regardless of what the applicant altered them to be. Of course, this is besides the fact that altering an application in most countries is fraud all by itself. The contract is the part that you receive back after your application is accepted, and its not negotiable. In the act of applying you have implied consent to the original terms of the application.

isnt it basically forgery?? he is editing the original document

reply to post by AncientShade


The bank gets a percentage of each transaction from the vendor. So, since it is getting money from the contract there is consideration. So this is not a reason to invalidate it.

Sadly, this ruins the whole story since with our insane give-always from the tax payer to the banks, they can still make a good profit with a credit card at 0%!

Originally posted by CookieMonster09

I believe you are quite mistaken... all contracts are negotiable. but don't take my word for it...

Are you licensed to practice law in Russia?

Since we are talking legalese, there is no "consideration" for the credit card company to issue a credit card at 0% interest. There has to be something of value for the credit card company to enter into the contract for the contract to be valid. In this case, there was no benefit for the credit card company. Hence, the contract is invalid.

I agree with most of your rebuttal on this topic, but have selected this point for one very simple reason. Just because there is no gain for the issuer, that does not make the contract invalid. That's a child's interpretation. Not meaning to offend (though I understand that it may), but, that's what it is.

I agree with the rest of what you said, yes it is still credit card fraud, and no, he is not ethical or moral in any way. Fact is, under basic contract law, even if you're something like a credit union or bank, you must still review the contract once the applicant has signed and agreed. It is entirely the credit card company's fault, because generally, unless issued over the phone, and hence recorded, all contracts are to be read and reviewed by the provider.
Most companies elect to read the contract out loud, in the presence of the applicant, and then both parties sign in the presence of the other. The fact that this company acts as though you're entering a competition, and not as though they're doing something serious, means that they really deserved the wake up call. A loophole, however deceitful, is a loophole. So, whilst we remain on the subject of legalese, he has every right to exploit the loop, just as so many other people do. It is the job of the credit company to close that loop so that no one else may exploit it. A simple "this is legally binding and may not be changed or negotiated without first contacting the issuer" would suffice.

reply to post by choos


It seems he did forge them... but hey... how does he know its not the bank's doing? Haha Let us dream! These things are nearly impossible in the states. Consumer vs. banks = FATALITY ---> Consumer. Had a couple friends who had their homes repossessed ;/