Bankruptcy Law backfires on credit card issuers

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[SALChamps03]

I learned my lessons about credit cards. I do not care how many frequent flier miles are offered. I do not care what kind of discount I will receive. I will never ever again use a credit card. Christmas is over and I owe less than I owed before Christmas, not more. I paid for everything. That required me to make choices. Imagine that!

[brwnsuga]

Credit card companies don't force people to accept cards just like Hostess doesn't force people to stuff their faces with Twinkies. You have to use good judgement and moderation with everything. Shopping is my favorite past time. But my hubby cut me off. We paid off our cards and closed the accounts. So if I don't have the money, I don't get the shoes......... shoes....shooooes..........

[Kieri]

I think "high heating costs" can be added to that list. We just had our propane tank filled and it wasn't pretty. December was very cold here in MI (until a couple of days ago) and I don't want to think of what January and February are going to be like.

BTW: I saw the story where California is banning woodburning fireplaces. I don't know all the details, but I hope the Northeast libs don't get any stupid ideas.

[The_Trooper]

I have absolutely no sympathy for the CC companies. They use every dirty trick in the book to get people tied up in debt and paying their usurious rates. Among the things that peeve me:

1) Obscene interest rates as high as 30%.
2) Over limit fees (hey, if there's a limit, why aren't you stopped from going over it?)
3) Cancelling promotional rates if a payment is a day late. Say you've run up 15K in charges or balance transfers at a promotional rate. If you're just one day late, they can impose their published rate that can go as high as 30%! I have no reason to believe that they would not post timely payments as late.
4) Arbitrary rate hikes. If your credit score goes down, they reserve the right to raise your rate! Even if you've paid your payments on time and have made no late payments on any other loans! They can still raise your rate just because you may have run up a high balance on another card. This makes it more difficult for the credit-challenged lender to pay off their balance. It does nothing to protect the CC company, since they've already extended the credit.
5) Fine print that can confuse or trick the less savvy. I.E. offering a 3% promotional rate for six months but charging a 3% transfer fee. This makes the actual rate 9%. Do the math!

Of course, the goal of these companies is to get people of limited means to run up big balances at 15 - 30% that they can't pay (and thus forcing them to borrow some more).

However, if your're smart, you can outfox them for ahwile, using balance transfers and taking advantages of miles and reward points.

People should certainly be responsible with their finances. However, I find it absurd when CC companies cry to the government while hooking high-risk borrowers into charging up big blances at usurious rates. If we're going to tighten the bankruptcy laws, I would urge imposing some reform on this industry. (i.e. a grace period on cancelling promotional rates due to late payments, maxing the APR @ say 20%, prohibiting arbitrary rate hikes due to a change in credit).

Peace!

[A. Pole]

I have no reason to believe that they would not post timely payments as late.

They do it.

[connectthedots]

That was and is bankruptcy fraud, which the previous law covered. Thos items would have to be returned or would be considered nondischargable.

[Nowhere Man]

I've got relatives in Europe. While many times they have had to wait a long time to see a doctor, no one died.

I'm not putting up socialized medicine as the solution, but our own system is far from utopian.

I have a friend in Sweden and he can get into the doctor's office right away and he only has to pay $15 co-pay per visit. I think it is just a matter of time before we have some sort of single payer system here, if it is run right, I don't think it would be a bad idea either.

[Nowhere Man]

Those are the most interesting posts. They harken back to a philosophy of the Victorian age that found its way into novels, laws and a general attitude. Some of this was Calvinistic (good people prosper and bad people suffer) and some of it was simply a way to demonize the poor, and some of it was based on the tenets of Herbert Spencer (survival of the fittest). Dickens lampoons it in A Christmas Carol (Scrooge) and other works.

It's a fascinating belief system.

I also heard it explained in another form called "prosperity gospel" too, IIRC, I tihnk it was Sam the Sham who brought that to my attention a while back. Still though, that old Time Calvinist thinking sort of reminds me of the Buddhist/Hindu view of karma to where one's postition in life, be they rich, poor, sick, healthy and so on goes back to the person's actions in this life and prior lives although I am not familiar with the Calvinistic position on reincarnation.

[Nowhere Man]

David Graham Phillips' "Susan Lenox, Her Rise and Fall" (1908 published 1917) and Theodore Drieser's "Sister Carrie" (1900) are about women of that time that were held in scorn, well that is in the case of Phillips because the main character was a girl born out of wedlock and no one would relalycut her a break because if it, but both books, the authors from time to time sort of retreat into a "Dobie Gillis" outside person style narrative on how the lower classes had to live and get by. "Lenox..." (parts of the book almost had me in tears and would be a good antidote for any "randroids" out there) was a true eye opener for me and although some of the conditions are mitigated in today's world, many of that still exists in one for or another and I fear a lot of these economic policies along with the undoing of many reform the Progressives of 100 years ago,we could return to some sort of a world like that. I think for honorable mention, I would list Jack London, Upton Sinclair and Stephen Crane where some of their works addrss those problems too.

[durasell]

esther waters by george moore was of the same genre.

Much of that literature from the victorian age is a reaction to herbert spencer, then in vogue. Rand basically took a lot of herbert spencer's stuff and re-cycled it.

[A. Pole]

I have a friend in Sweden and he can get into the doctor's office right away and he only has to pay $15 co-pay per visit.

I have a comparison based on personal experience. When I broke my foot, while living in Communist Poland, I went to the emergency and I waited few minutes to get help. When I broke the same foot (I know, it is lame) in America, having private insurance, I had to wait couple hours.

Another difference was that in Poland the nurse diagnosed the state of bones by touch, in USA they did X-ray. The rest was exactly the same. The main problem in Poland was not long waiting time but the lack of equipment caused by the relative poverty of the country.

[Nowhere Man]

I have a comparison based on personal experience. When I broke my foot, while living in Communist Poland, I went to the emergency and I waited few minutes to get help. When I broke the same foot (I know, it is lame) in America, having private insurance, I had to wait couple hours.

Another difference was that in Poland the nurse diagnosed the state of bones by touch, in USA they did X-ray. The rest was exactly the same. The main problem in Poland was not long waiting time but the lack of equipment caused by the relative poverty of the country

I know, I remember when I was 11 years old on vacation back in 1977, I developed a fever, dunno why, while on the way to Texas, We went to an emergency room, Mom had me on her insurance, and it took a couple of hours for someone to see me. The hospital didn't do much, so my mother and grandmother got the fever down by taking me back to the motel room, tossing me into the shower and wrapping me in wet towels. I think we spent an extra day there until I was fit to travel, once it broke, it was kind of nice sitting back, drinking fluids, reading comic books and watching "Charlie's Angels." B-)

Another emergency room experience is when I cut my left hand open on the pinky side in 2003 while exiting my vehicle by slipping on the ice as I hit my garage. I cut an artery open, went to the emergency room, waited about 30 minutes, not too bad, really, got stitches, a tetanus (sp, so I don't get lockjaw) shot and sent home. It got infected, a week later, I was back there and they admitted me. I got a private room too, it was a busy night and that was the only place they can put me. I had to have surgery the next morning. In fact when the nurse came in the following morning to ask my breakfast choice, I had to remind them I can't eat, I was going into surgery. B-) I wasn't allowed water or food after 12 midnite, OK, I did cheat,I had water at 12:30 but a half an hour ain't gonna kill me. B-) Well, I had surgery and could have went home in 3 day, but the County in bureaucratic fashion kept me an extra 2 days, I had two doctors, the surgeon and the infectious disease one that reports back to the county. I just laid around, watching the coverage of the Columbia disaster, it happened the day before I went in, Civil War documentaries on the History Channel and Art Bell at nights when I couldn't sleep. I had a strep infection, could have lost all or part of my hand. My aunt had a similar problem, she got a staph infection in her foot from a cortisone shot and almost lost her foot, she was in hospital for 2 weeks.

To top it off, I was helping someone start a business by taking care of his IT needs as well as working for him by placing mobile notaries/attorneys to close loans. Well, we did get health insurance but since I was getting out of my car, car insurance covers it since car insurance covers ANY accident that involves the car no matter how mundane, at least my plan does. I really, really think God was watching out for me on that one, later on, we found out we didn;t have any health insurance at all since my boss didn't pay the premiums before things went under. Still I did have a social worker with the State offering help if I needed it and I kept her number handy in case if I did need it but everything was covered so I didn't need assistance at all. The business soon closed up a few months later, my boss let my grade school buddy go, he was so embarrassed to tell him mom at home, he hid out over my place for a week while I was on medical leave, basically, we played Playstation all day. B-)

[Nowhere Man]

Much of that literature from the victorian age is a reaction to herbert spencer, then in vogue. Rand basically took a lot of herbert spencer's stuff and re-cycled it.

Hmmm, got to look him up, you hve peaked my curiousity again. B-)

[redgolum]

My brother in law said much the same thing.

The Big Money players are a lot like cattle. Once they get spooked, it is hard to define what did it to them.

I have also been hearing that the retail sales over Christmas were very bad. Many were hoping for a surge in sales during the next week. Not a good sign.

[durasell]

There's definitely something in the air...

[Luke Skyfreeper]

I'm certainly not going to condemn you, I've been there, and done that. I went into a ruinous custody battle with my ex some ten years ago, ten years after the divorce, because she was going to get remarried, to a convicted child rapist. I had no choice, I did what I could to save my kids.

Un-freakin-believable. She musta been totally out of her freakin' mind.

I only got health insurance at the beginning of this month, I couldn't afford it since September, 2000. For many people, the bankruptcy laws ARE their health insurance.

I understand that. I would've had a dental appointment today, except that even at 40% off their regular price (this office has a sliding scale for people with less income, 40% off is as low as they go) we still can't afford for me to go to the dentist unless I'm in pain. Can't afford it even then, but some things you simply have to do.

[Luke Skyfreeper]

I fully expect all of them to declare bankruptcy, not because they were foolish, but because they tried to help each other out and then got slammed with medical bills.

Good heavens.

[Luke Skyfreeper]

I called a few times and once got him on the phone I hinted at what this was about but he didn't seem to care.

I'll wager it eventually got his attention.

[TheWriterTX]

It breaks my heart, Luke, it really does. We took up a collection here in the neighborhood just to help them offset some of the bills, but my girlfriend's chemo co-pay alone is several hundred dollars a pop, after insurance.

Talk about a streak of incredibly bad luck. Neither my girlfriend or her father saw their medical problems coming. He was physically fit one week - then bam! - he's suddenly in the hospital and undergoing surgery. She was dealing with back pain for a few weeks, thought it was a pulled muscle until the pain persisted, only to find out she's riddled with cancer. And both of them drained their resources before all of this helping the brother, his wife, and their young daughter hold onto their house. The brother wasn't a slacker, either. He took a contract half-way across the country, and spent 6 months away from his family, to pay the bills in the hopes of that work leading to more work. Unfortunately, when the contract ended, so did the leads. He's worked several low-pay jobs just to bring in some kind of money while he looks for other work, and his wife started her own landscaping business to put food on the table. As it is, they will probably have to sell their house - they were hoping to hang onto it for their daughter's sake, and renting is just as expensive as their mortgage payment right now.

I pray for them, as they have been great neighbors, wonderful friends, always ready to help someone out in their time of need.

Not all the folks that declare bankruptcy are slackers, or didn't prepare for a rainy day, as some other posters have suggested. These folks got hit by a hurricane, and my girlfriend hasn't seen the half of it yet.

[wouldntbprudent]

This is the exact type of situation in which bankruptcy is legitimate.

However, it is the exception.