Gap credit card - Don't sign up for it.

I made a purchase in late April, 07 for $22.89 and made a payment during late May, 07. Apparently, the payment was not recieved in time and I was charged a $3.00 late fee. There were, however, no subsequent bills informing me of this late fee, nor any information on the account at all, for 6 months, until now, in November, when I just received a call from the collections department demanding more than a hundred dollars. Keep in mind, the product itself was fully paid off - this hundred dollar charge was based on the $3.00 late fee that I was not aware of at all until I was called by this collection service. This is literally my first experience with credit card debt, from my first and only purchase with my Gap credit card. In retrospect, I should've called the customer service line to have a representative quote my accout at zero, but, call me naive, I assumed that Gap would promptly inform me of any late fees.

The collection service agent who I talked to was as nice as he could be, while still maintaining the assumption that I'm a felon, obviously trying to bilk the company. He stayed uncomfortably mum when I told him I hadn't seen a Gap payment invoice for the last 6 months. I have a feeling that it might be standard procedure, but even if it is, the agent was still nice enough to knock my hundred dollar late charge down to $41.90.

This whole experience has really sullied my feelings towards Gap. Like everyone else, I just signed up on the card to save the 20% on my purchase ...of 22 dollars, and now I'm being charged $41.90 as consequence. I'd suggest for people to not let themselves get talked into signing up for the Gap credit card. I don't think there's any intentional fraud, but the system is certainly not designed to be user-friendly, and all the mistakes are costly and presumed to be the fault of the customer.