Posted on 03/05/2005 8:50:28 PM PST by drt1
Try this from MBNA. When I was in grad school I had a 42K credit limit. I didn't ask for it and having gone right from college to grad school I never had a real income. If I had run it up and defaulted they would have nobody to blame but themselves. No other type of lender in the world would give a college student and unsecured loan in that amount.
Would you have preferred it if those credit cards were not available when you used them?
In many cases it is just that only in this disease the CC Companies are there offering you another drink of the Kool Aid and charging ever more for each gulp. I just think it's wrong to let them collect more than a reasonable rate of return from anyone and I also think it is wrong of the CC Companies to expect you and I to make up for their decision to extend credit to obviously poor risks.
Finally, we get to ID Theft. Why is it so easy for someone to obtain credit in another's name - Why? Because these leaches are eager to extend credit to ANYONE and they are content to pick up the pieces later. If it weren't for their lax policies ID theft would be much less of a problem. If ID Theft actually cost them money that they couldn't make up on our backs, they would strengthen these policies. FWIW
"I'm calling my Senator and Rep on this one."
They are all whores. If you can't pony up tens of millions in contributions they won't give a rats ass what you say. The bill has been bought. Doesn't hurt to rip into them for their stupid logic though.
I had over 100k in credit on two MBNA cards, and no... I'm hardly a 100k line of credit kind of guy. They now up my limits practically every month begging me to use it. No thanks.
"They now up my limits practically every month begging me to use it. No thanks."
I stopped using my card too (use another). They send me interest free checks for 15 mos, etc. begging me to use them. They also call all the time but never when I am home fortunatley.
The reasonable rate of return is what the market will allow. As long as there are suckers willing to pay 30% interest in $40 late fees, that is the reasonable rate of return.
Finally, we get to ID Theft.
I hear you there. I was a victim of identity theft years ago. I discovered this when the auto dealer tried to charge me 18% interest for a car loan (no, I didn't take it). It took quite a while to fix the situation. I now check my credit report every now and then.
The absolute best CC is Amex. Pay it off every month and their premium services have gotten me out of more jams that I can remember.
She would have been better off, that is for certain. There are other alternatives. Ask Dave Ramsey
You haven't read a credit / finance agreement lately, have you? If you enter into one, you'd better make sure you have adequate legal representation, or that overdue library book might just cost you a few thousand dollars.
The way the fees are now imposed, "people would be better off if they stopped paying" once they get in over their heads, said North Carolina bankruptcy attorney T. Bentley Leonard. Once you stop paying, creditors write off the debt and sell it to a debt collector. "They may harass you, but your balance doesn't keep rising. That's the irony."
Girlfriend of mine did this. She got sick, lost her job, couldn't pay her Visa bill, ran out of things to sell. She just started ignoring the bills from FirstUSA Visa. After awhile they called her up and offered to take three-quarters of the total debt. She said no. They offered to take half. She said no. They finally settled for about a third of the total debt, so she finally paid them $2000.
Credit Card companies are no angels. One time, they said I was late, having posted my payment on legal holiday, which was the day after it was due. I wrote to them, explaining that there is no mail delivery on legal holidays, and my payment was therefore on time. They relented and took off the charge.
They're not angels and they are more flexible than people realize. You can get your interest rates reduced by threatening to transfer balancing to another card. You can get the interest stopped completely by entering into a work-out deal. And even pay a fraction of the total owed with no consequences to your credit rating as long as they post it as "paid in full," which many will.
And on the other end of the scale, a competent lawyer would have advised her, if she was going to go bankrupt at all, to do so right away rather than continue on for years. Again, the root cause is ignorance.
Congressman Billybob
If one finds oneself deep in hock to credit card lenders, there is one solution that will always work: simply stiff them. Ignore the bills and phone calls and never send them another dime. They will rant, rail, and harass the borrower, and of course place the information on one's credit reports, but little else will occur; the cost of taking legal action prevents them from doing more than that to collect a five or ten thousand dollar debt. Instead of sending in payments, the debtor simply uses his or her funds to pay off any easily repossessable items that the lenders might attach (e.g. one's car) and hunkers down without borrowing for seven years. After seven years' time has elapsed since the last date of credit activity, the credit reporting agencies will clear any negative information from one's credit report, allowing one to begin again with a clean slate.
It's not an ideal solution, but it works. One should NEVER gamble one's home mortgage to pay off credit card debt; instead, one should simply stop borrowing and wait seven years, and the problem will go away on its own.
I would have preferred it if they had charged one fixed interest rate, the way my mortgage lender does. I don't have my home loan fluctuating all over the place, or my auto loan, or any other loan. Why should credit cards, which are after all just loans, fluctuate? Late fees I can understand, but the interest rate should not go up precipitously. There used to be usury laws in this country.
John, I'm glad you posted that - the same thing happened to me - but with a car dealer's finace division - thank goodness I used the USPS "Delivery Confirmation" - I was constantly having to call them and "remind" them they received my payment on time - and to credit me back the penalty fee ($25 if I remember correctly) I just wonder how endemic this little "secret tactic" is?
...of course there is that pesky moral issue about paying back money you borrowed.
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