The 5/22 mail brought a letter from AT&T Universal Card. I almost didn’t open it because it was preprinted “OPEN IMMEDIATELY: Important Account Notice” and had a preprinted first class indicia. Obviously, another of the cash advance check mailings I receive 4x a year or so.

But no. The letter inside began: “Citi, the issuer of your AT&T Universal Cash Rewards Card, has decided to discontinue this credit card for business reasons. Therefore, your account will be closed on 6/30/06. This letter outlines important information about he closing of your account.” And so it did… several single spaced paragraphs to inform me what happens to my cardmember benefits (mostly going away) and outstanding balance (it’s still there) before a final “thank you for your business” at the end.

Now let’s see here. I’ve had this card for maybe 20 years. As I recall it was a pioneer—the first high limit, fee free MasterCard. Over the years it changed hands several times and various institutions paid what would add up to several billion dollars for the customer portfolio and brand identification. And now suddenly it’s worth no more than a curt “thank you for your business” ?

Ironically, the very same day brought an email from AT&T Universal Card. They want to let me know that I should refinance my home at a low home equity rate through them because, as a Universal Card customer, “you’ve earned it!”

That quotidian email is an example of why marketers believe business relationships have value—especially when you have the kind of relationship that gives you legal permission to send an email solicitation to your customer list. Yet, I’m assuming this will be the last I hear from my friends at Universal Card. (The deadline for my loan application is 6/30, which makes sense because my card relationship goes kablooie then.)

Citi evidently believes the Universal Card no longer has any business value. I disagree. Anybody want to join me and take up a collection to buy the brand? I’m hoping $1000 will do it.

I was recently a victim of identity theft. First, my credit card company called me wondering why I had been charging so much at walmart.com. When I said I hadn’t used my walmart.com account since 2004 (which I know because I keep all my old emails), they suggested somebody had gotten hold of my credit card info and suggested I cancel my account and get a new card. Which I did.

Then, a few days later, another call. Had I changed my billing address to somewhere in Arizona? No, I hadn’t, and the ability to do so meant that somebody had hacked my online account with the bank in a major way. This set off alarm bells requiring cancellation of the new card, plus alerts to the credit reporting bureaus of which maybe the worse repercussion for me, as a marketer, is that I am automatically removed from credit card solicitation lists for the next 5 years. (No more Capital One swipe samples for me!)

I thought the whole matter was handled just about right by CitiBank. They were efficient, not accusatory, and the paperwork required (two notarized statements from me) was tedious but reasonable under the circumstances. That got me thinking about what is the right balance between companies protecting themselves and providing benefits to consumers.

A serious lack of such balance was exhibited in my first purchase recently of a “digital edition” from Amazon. It came with onerous digital rights management (DRM) protection that requires me to go through a complex registration process, where I sign in with Adobe online, simply to be able to read the document I have paid for on my computer. It simply ain’t worth it, folks. I asked for my money back. Their rights are protected but they lose a sale. Good deal? Not for me, not for the publisher, certainly not for the author who probably has no idea this is going on.

Back in my “suit” days, I had a client who asked me if it would be a good idea to sign up with a bad check protection service which would make good any bogus paper in return for a 1.5 percent commission on ALL checks received. Sounded somewhat plausible until we did the math and found that the bad check problem was actually costing considerably less than 1.5% of sales.

People who make their living trying to cheat other people and businesses will probably find a way to do so, at least some of the time. A business needs to find a balance where it makes things somewhat more difficult for the bad guys without penalizing the average customer with unreasonable security measures. This is the same logic that applies when we talk to our clients about money-back guaranteed, isn’t it?

A money back guarantee, especially on a mail order or internet purchase, answers the big objection “what if I get it and I don’t like it after I see it?” Marketers who are reluctant to make guarantees are afraid that somebody is going to take advantage of them. But the bad guys will anyway… and meanwhile they’ve scared off a lot of potential customers who were on the fence.