So you thought your kids were safe from the scourge of credit card debt when you sent them away to college this year? Just because Congress passed a student-protection law?
Wake up to the real world. Credit card issuers found a glide path right through the law’s intent, thanks to their enablers at the Federal Reserve. [...]
What Jane Says: Credit Cards
- Credit card interest rates rise but that’s a good thing
- POSTED 08.24.10
I’m about to annoy you. You hate the fact that banks have been raising interest rates on credit card balances. By the rules of competition, however, the rise in visible costs will turn out to be a good thing. Fees you can see will eventually go down.
You’ve been paying high costs for credit right along, [...]
Consumers won. Banks lost. That summarizes the consumer piece of the financial reform bill.
On the other part of the bill that affects individuals, my verdict flips. Investors lost, Wall Street won.
Taking the consumer side first, color me thrilled that Congress created a potentially strong Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. When President Obama proposed it last [...]
- More Strapped Consumers Are Protecting Their Credit Cards and Letting Their Houses Go
- POSTED 06.2.10
If unemployment hits, which bills do you cover first? Traditionally, that would be food, utilities, transportation and housing. If you couldn’t stretch your income to cover credit card payments, you let them go.
Such thinking is so pre-2008. Since the real estate meltdown, growing numbers of straitened borrowers are changing their priorities. They’re protecting their credit [...]
- Nuts to credit card over-limit fees
- POSTED 02.20.10
New credit card rules take effect Monday, to block some of the banks’ most abusive practices. If you’re not careful, however, you might find yourself agreeing to be abused again. There will be campaigns to get you, voluntarily, to take one of the nastier fees back onto your account.
I’m talking about the over-limit fees that [...]
