AAFES

Orlando of Travis AFB, CA October 30, 2009

We have been fighting with AAFES about our military star card that we have with them. There have been several times where we have made payments and nothing showed on our account. We have had fraudulent charges on our account as well. We were able to dispute those charges in 2007 and got it taken care of. Now we are fighting with them again with the total amount of our balance and our old dispute that they are saying now was never taken care of. They continue to garnish my pay, they are sending my commander letters saying that my account is late. I am in the process of another dispute and instead of them helping me and my family they are putting me in a bind. They have garnished my pay six times since August, there were two times where I only had 500.00 left of my pay to take care of my family and pay my bills. They told me that before letters get sent to the commanding officers a letter would be sent the account holder to notify them of any issues, these letters are never sent to me. All I want is for all of this to be over and to never deal with AAFES every again.

Sheri of Troy, AL June 21, 2009

I separated from the Air Force honorably in August 2001. My remaining debt to AAFES was taken from my last pay check. Since then, AAFES has been charging me interest on a closed account. I was told while I was separating that AAFES has the right to charge me a "closed account" fee. They have taken every stimulus payment I was do and continue to charge me interest fees for this account that has been paid off and closed for nine years.

Richard of Amado, AZ June 19, 2009

For those servicemembers having problem with the credit card issue, is there is a class action lawsuit: it the Briggs V. AAFES Class Action, Known as Briggs V. united States, NO CV-07-5760, this is the law Office Address: 44 Montgomery Dtreet, Suite 3830, San Francisco, Ca 94104, Tel. (415)901-0500, Facsimile: (415)901-0504

Nadia of Fountain, CO February 27, 2009

Nadia of Fountain CO (02/27/09)
I am a veteran with over 5 years in the United Sates Army. I came in the Military in 2002 and I was stationed in Germany. While stationed there I applied for the Star Card in order to help me buy uniforms or any other items that I may have needed. I deployed in May 2003 to Iraq after 3 months in Germany. I only used the Star Card 2 or 3 times totaling to less than 400 dollars.

I never received any bills from AAFES while I was deployed to Iraq, but when I was redeploying back in July 2004 I was told by my Commander that I had an outstanding AAFES bill to pay. So while in Kuwait I went ahead to the PX and paid the full amount of over 700 dollars. I told them I did not want to use their card any longer and I never did use it. But when I redeployed to Iraq in March 2005 they started to garnish my pay and I could not understand why. So I had to travel to Mosul to use their main PX where I had to pay another 800 dollars for a card that I NEVER used. But I just wanted it to be over with so I paid it and cancelled the card for good, but by that time my credit was already ruined because they already reported me. I'm so ANGRY because its still on my credit and I never used that card after 2003 and they never sent me anything letting me know what was going on.

But that's not even the real ISSUE here!! I was Honorably Discharged from the Military on July 2007. When I was deployed to Iraq the first time from May 2003 to August 2004 I used the PX at Baghdad International Airport for the 15 months that I was deployed there. I either used cash or majority of the time I used my Bank of America card. I was only 19 with no kids no husband and NO other bills so I had PLENTY of money in my account to pay for ANYTHING that I purchased. Since this was the first OIF we did not have electronic ways to use our cards till later on in the deployment. So what they used was, they made carbon copy of our credit cards/bank cards for every purchase that was made. I dont have a credit card because I dont trust credit card companies so I just use my bank card for everything because I have a Visa logo.

Well I never heard anything from AAFES till July 2006, 3 years AFTER my first deployment, by this time I was a Sergeant stationed in Fort Carson, Colorado. I was married, purchased a home, and had 2 car payments and expecting my first child. I noticed that over 800 dollars had been garnished from my pay and I noticed this in July 2006. I found out that it was AAFES that was garnishing my money and I was finally able to contact them in August to figure out what was going on and they told me that I owed them 5,000!!!! They had never sent me anything saying that I owed them any money. They told me that when I was deployed to Iraq from May 2003 to August 2004 the purchases that I had made at the PX had not been paid. I told them that could not be true because when I deployed back to Germany in August 2004 I had over 20,000 in my account so there was plenty of money in there to pay for whatever I had purchased at the time. So I decided to call my bank and ask why they didnt pay AAFES when I had made the purchases. And my bank (Bank of America) told me that when AAFES tried to get paid it was 2-3 years later and they said they didnt pay for anything that was OVER 1 year old. Even so I still asked my bank to send all my transactions starting from 2002 when I first opened the account.

I called AAFES back and told them that my bank had paid the transactions that were not a year old but they could not pay for any transactions that were past due 1 year. And AAFES told me they knew this and they were going to try and get their money any way they could because it was a lot of money. But I told them it was not my fault, and they just simply told me told me that there were many soldiers in my situation. They said they did not receive the carbon copies of our cards (bank cards/credit cards) till 2005-2006 and thats when they started to sort out the paperwork so that they could get paid. But how is that MY fault!??! I told them back when I made the purchases I DID have the money to pay for everything I bought and the whole time I was certain they had taken their money. But now that I had more financial responsibilities I couldnt afford to pay 5,000.00 out of pocket. And I thought they would've known they wouldn't be able to claim people owed them money if was over 3 years later. Even so I still went ahead and tried to settle with them just so I could get it over with; I didnt feel like going through all the trouble to dispute it. They still continued to garnish my pay until October 2006. But then they put the money back when I told them I wanted to figure a monthly payment plan that I could afford. So we agreed to 130.00 a month but they never sent me ANYTHING in the mail for me to pay them and when I would try and call them but the Fraud Manager was never around and no one would EVER help me (it was a Ms. Cox, can't remember her fist name). Why would they do that!?!?!? All I wanted to do was just pay them so they would stop taking my money without permission. I continued to call and still no one could help me, and then one day when I called they just told me that I didnt have to pay them any longer.

I found it strange but I never heard from them again till 2008 when they sent me a letter saying that now I owed them over 6,000.00 because of the interest that had accrued. What am I supposed to do!?!? I dont have this kind of money on hand. I know this is not my fault and I know there are a lot of soldiers going through this and its very painful. I have several fellow soldiers that are not in the military who also owe money to AAFES because AAFES tried to get paid over years later. And what ended up happing to them is that their taxes where taken in order to pay them back. And I just filed my taxes and have not received them and I do believe AAFES has gone and taken my hard earned money without letting me know anything AGAIN!! I know this is WRONG but who can help us?? It is not our fault that AAFES does not know how to conduct their business properly. The questioned I've asked millions of times now is why wasn't AAFES able to send those carbon copies of our cards back to the States just as fast as they were bringing their products in to Iraq to sell to the Soldiers!?!?!? I need someone's help, this cannot be legal.

Jerry of Baton Rouge, LA December 12, 2008

Jerry of Baton Rouge LA (12/12/08)
They have been taking my entire tax return for the last 6-7 years. I am not sure of the date of my honorable discharge, but I am quite sure that the debt is over 10 years old. I read that there was a class-action suit against AAFES.

With no tax return refund every year for the last few years, it has made my finiancial situation tighter and has affected my credit.

William of Fort Wainwright, CT May 15, 2005

William of Fort Wainwright CT (05/15/05)
I bought a 99.00 3.5 HP mower from my local AAFES and had it half a summer and it refused to start, i tried new plugs and filter but the plug just was not getting any spark. I read alot about murray mowers on here and am baffled. The problem seems to be with the Briggs and Stratton mower which in my exp were supose to be very reliable motors. bottom line is i got what i paid for but i did expect atleast 2 seasons out of it. i see many more exspensive mowers out there but most of them run a Briggs motor also so what is there to do? i guess go with a diff brand motor and company

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