Seriously? $1.50? (AGR credit card fee)

[PVD]

These type of situations occur across the board in the credit card industry and the brand or affinity group really doesn't matter much. It is a function of the issuing bank.

 

[jis]

Yes. It seems to me that we are beating a dead horse to pulp here. There is really nothing unusual that happened. If a bill is not paid in full an interest is charged. that is part of the standard contract. There is no dramatic lie involved here of any sort. Mountain out of a mole hill I am afraid.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Yes. It seems to me that we are beating a dead horse to pulp here. There is really nothing unusual that happened. If a bill is not paid in full an interest is charged. that is part of the standard contract. There is no dramatic lie involved here of any sort. Mountain out of a mole hill I am afraid.

Making a mountain out of a molehill is such an apt phrase. The US consumer credit market is built on the hope of eventually turning minor mistakes and missteps into mountains of crippling debt. Just like the mobster loan sharks of yesteryear. Personally, I believe that just because you write usury level interest rates into a formal contract doesn't suddenly make them reasonable or unimportant. I've never missed a payment myself, but I have seen the repercussions for those who did, and it's not pretty.

 

[PVD]

Pay on time and you won't pay anything. Very different with a loanshark. Why can't people take responsibility for their own actions?

 

[Devil's Advocate]

Pay on time and you won't pay anything. Very different with a loanshark. Why can't people take responsibility for their own actions?

I paid every bill on time and still got stung for thousands of dollars in fraud the bank charged and then refused to make whole. But hey, I still have my legs so I guess everything is just peachy. <_<

 

[jis]

Yes. It seems to me that we are beating a dead horse to pulp here. There is really nothing unusual that happened. If a bill is not paid in full an interest is charged. that is part of the standard contract. There is no dramatic lie involved here of any sort. Mountain out of a mole hill I am afraid.

Making a mountain out of a molehill is such an apt phrase. The US consumer credit market is built on the hope of eventually turning minor mistakes and missteps into mountains of crippling debt. Just like the mobster loan sharks of yesteryear. Personally, I believe that just because you write usury level interest rates into a formal contract doesn't suddenly make them reasonable or unimportant. I've never missed a payment myself, but I have seen the repercussions for those who did, and it's not pretty.

I agree it is not reasonable. So other than bitching and venting about it here, what do you propose that we do about it?

Yup, I have missed an occasional payment, simply because I forgot, and the consequence each time was that I had to pay a late fee, which itself is unreasonable. But full payment was the end of that episode, and life went on as usual after that.

At some point I made a choice that the convenience of using a credit card was worth the annoyances associates with it, and not much has changed since then both in the department of conveniences and annoyances. So life goes on.

 

[PVD]

There is a big difference between fraud (not your fault, shouldn't be your problem) and late fees or interest because of not paying fully or on time.

 

[jis]

There is a big difference between fraud (not your fault, shouldn't be your problem) and late fees or interest because of not paying fully or on time.

Absolutely. Whether the contract one entered into is fair or not is a separate discussion from whether the terms of the contract were followed.

 

[Devil's Advocate]

There is a big difference between fraud (not your fault, shouldn't be your problem) and late fees or interest because of not paying fully or on time.

Absolutely. Whether the contract one entered into is fair or not is a separate discussion from whether the terms of the contract were followed.

The terms and conditions for each outcome are written by the same people to benefit the same party. They write the rules, they choose how to apply the rules, and we suffer the consequences. There's no section of the contract that says "Here's the one special part where we promise not to screw with you just because we hold all the cards." You can attempt to take them to court if you want, but you'll spend at least as much (if not more) trying to recover your money with no assurance you'll get anything back. Even if you win you'll simply use that money to pay off your legal bills and end up right back where you started. Do you think I was born a bitter old man? It's only when we finally see how the sausage is made that we lose our appetite for false equivalency. Credit accounts come with a massive power imbalance, that's why they also come with tens (or even hundreds) of thousands of "free" monkey points to distract you from the extra risk you're casually accepting.

 

[jis]

There is a big difference between fraud (not your fault, shouldn't be your problem) and late fees or interest because of not paying fully or on time.

Absolutely. Whether the contract one entered into is fair or not is a separate discussion from whether the terms of the contract were followed.

The terms and conditions for each outcome are written by the same people to benefit the same party. They write the rules, they choose how to apply the rules, and we suffer the consequences. There's no section of the contract that says "Here's the one special part where we promise not to screw with you just because we hold all the cards." You can attempt to take them to court if you want, but you'll spend at least as much (if not more) trying to recover your money with no assurance you'll get anything back. Even if you win you'll simply use that money to pay off your legal bills and end up right back where you started. Do you think I was born a bitter old man? It's only when we finally see how the sausage is made that we lose our appetite for false equivalency. Credit accounts come with a massive power imbalance, that's why they also come with tens (or even hundreds) of thousands of "free" monkey points to distract you from the extra risk you're casually accepting.

My question to you still remains, what exactly do you propose that we do about it other than bitching and moaning here? We are guaranteed to see a long rant from you on these subjects when they arise several time, and that is fine. but how is that productive in any way? Of course if that is what takes for you to keep from going postal, I guess that is a positive.

 

[PVD]

Yes, credit card contracts are slanted towards the issuer.Probably the most egregious thing happening today is the proliferation of arbitration and anti class action clauses. But again, contracts are not unilateral, they require the agreement of both parties, I can say no and drop any card I want. I do not have to accept the terms.

 

[me_little_me]

It's BoA. I pay electronically by setting up each payment I make with my Credit Union. I always set the payments to be on the day due (or the Friday before the weekend). In all the years, I NEVER had a payment not paid on time until BoA and there were well over two thousand of them. BoA claimed a payment was late but refused to provide me the time it arrived. The Credit Union's payer said it was sent electronically and arrived on time even giving me a statement that their records showed it and got on the phone with BoA with me. Multiple BoA reps and managers refused to give me any info until I wrote to headquarters. They still claimed it was late but did finally give me the time they claimed it arrived. However, they finally waived the $65 charges. Since then, I set up all epayments to arrive 2 days early for all my accounts. Every single one is credited 2 days ahead. I think BoA screwed up and were unwilling to own up to it.

I dumped my fee card. I'd dump the other in a heartbeat when it is not to my Amtrak advantage to keep them. Dealing with Chase was a dream as compared to BoA.

 

[neroden]

They are designed to watch for even the most minor of mistakes and misunderstandings which they can eventually turn into a chain of never ending fees and fines.

While I won't disagree on the harm credit cards can do, I've never had an instance where paying in full the next month (minus any courtesy credits given) has resulted in ongoing fees. They've also included the fee in the statement amount on the next bill (so it wasn't hidden somewhere where it'd be hard to figure out what to pay to avoid interest.)

Some fees are definitely very punitive and if income is tight the unexpected fees can cause cascading issues, but I disagree that they're designed to blow up a minor mistake into endless fees if someone generally pays attention to their bills, especially if they contact the card issuer and remedy the mistake. Maybe I've just been extra lucky with credit cards, though.

You've been extra lucky. Both me and my father have been hit by the "MBNA fraud" where the credit card company pretends not to receive your payment when they get it in order to charge interest and penalties -- my father was actually hit by it with MBNA, back when it was first orignated, and I was hit by Chase on the former Amtrak card. MBNA pulled this off by managing to get their own branch of the post office so that they could lie about receipt dates; Chase did the same thing. Anyway, MBNA was eventually criminally convicted for doing this systematically, but banks still do it.

When I escalated with Chase they backed off -- they didn't admit guilt but they immediately refunded all the phony charges. MBNA did the same thing with my father. This is the behavior of a guilty company: they know most people won't escalate their complaints, so they refund the fraudulently obtained money to the people who *do* spend a lot of time and effort to push their complaints -- this avoids lawsuits and they still make money off the rest of the frauds. It works for them.

I've found that cards with annual fees usually play nicer with their customers -- perhaps because they have some income stream even if we pay off our bill each month. But not always.

Interesting to see that me_little_me got hit with the *electronic* version of the MBNA fraud at BoA -- so it's still one of banksters' standard frauds. As usual, escalating sufficiently causes them to back off.

If you don't know all the standard frauds that the banksters will pull, it's not a good idea to get involved with the banksters in any way. Even if you do know them, keep your real money elsewhere, at an institution which doesn't pull this sort of fraud. (I have money at a local bank, a local credit union, and one of only three reputable large stockbrokers in the US -- there are only three reputable large stockbrokers, and each of them has known problems, but mine is only known for problems around death and inheritance issues -- which is why my heirs have enough money elsewhere to get those straightened out.)

 

[PVD]

Probably the most egregious thing happening today is the proliferation of arbitration and anti class action clauses.

Incidents such as those is exactly why I made that comment a few posts back........

 

[Bob Dylan]

Probably the most egregious thing happening today is the proliferation of arbitration and anti class action clauses.

Incidents such as those is exactly why I made that comment a few posts back........

This!!!!

 

[seat38a]

It always surprises me on this forum how the "victims" always tend to be the same handful of people.

 

[PVD]

And exactly how is that different from life in general?