Starting February 2010, key provisions of the Credit Card Reform Act begin. Among the changes: credit card companies can’t retroactively raise your interest rate on an existing credit card balance – unless you’re 60 days or more late paying your bill. Even if your rate has been raised to a “default” rate, the new law restricts creditors to hitting you with that higher for just six months, if you pay on time. So every six months or so, starting today, call up your creditors and ask for lower interest rates. Often, credit card companies will lower your rate on the spot, simply because they don’t want to lose your business to another company offering lower rates. If you can knock down the interest rate on a card with a 21% interest rate to 12% or so, you’ll be saving yourself a lot of money. Your minimum payments will also be less each month.
Another benefit of the credit card reform law is that, starting February 2010, banks and other credit card issuers will be banned from charging fees to customers who pay their bills via the telephone or the Internet.
Why not check your FICO score ? The cheapest way to get a genuine FICO score is to get your free Equifax report from www.annualcreditreport.com and pay $7.95 for a FICO score.
Leave a Reply