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Credit card companies are watching you
marketplace ^ | July 8, 2009

Posted on 07/08/2009 3:13:08 PM PDT by JoeProBono

With credit card defaults rising, some companies are looking for reasons to cut your plastic. To make these decisions, banks rely on data about what you buy, where, and the company you keep. Stacey Vanek-Smith reports.

Not all that long ago credit-card companies were looking for reasons to give us credit. As we all know now, it didn't take much to get a shiny new piece of plastic in your wallet. But with credit-card defaults rising, those companies have started looking for reasons to take some of that credit away. To help them figure out how, banks are compiling thousands of bits of data, like what you buy, where you buy it, sometimes even the company you keep. As Marketplace's Stacey Vanek-Smith tell us, your credit card is watching you.

So, two guys walk into a bar, have a few drinks and split the bill on their credit cards. One guy's unemployed and in serious debt. The other has a job and pays all his bills on time. The joke is actually on both of them. Those drinks may have just cost them their credit....


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: creditcard; creditcards; lping
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To: JoeProBono

Watch out, last month they changed my due date and slapped me with a late fee!


21 posted on 07/08/2009 5:18:21 PM PDT by vigilante2
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To: vigilante2
Watch out, last month they changed my due date and slapped me with a late fee!

That's pretty obnoxious of them! I'm paranoid at missing the payment due date, since fees are so high. With each of my cards, I have an alert set so they email me a week or so before the payment is due. And my bill pay program does the same thing, as a backup.
22 posted on 07/08/2009 5:47:28 PM PDT by CottonBall
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To: JoeProBono
I have to disagree with you on this one. Summary: if you buy the wrong things or at wrong places you MAY lose your credit. Remember that this is unsecured debt AND Obama just signed a bill that says they cant raise your rates on existing balance even IF your credit rating plummets because you stop paying your other bills. I guarantee you if you have a good credit rating AND you pay the balance every month they will not give a crap how you use the card (except charging more makes them more money.)

Cutting off credit is good.

23 posted on 07/08/2009 6:40:46 PM PDT by sickoflibs (Socialist Conservatives: "'Big government is free because tax cuts pay for it'")
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To: sickoflibs

Have heard that some CC companies are not only cutting interest rates for some, but are also forgiving some of the debt. Is this true?


24 posted on 07/08/2009 6:48:42 PM PDT by Irish Eyes
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To: Irish Eyes; JoeProBono; rabscuttle385; ding_dong_daddy_from_dumas
RE “ Have heard that some CC companies are not only cutting interest rates for some, but are also forgiving some of the debt. Is this true?

Credit card companies have always forgave debt for deadbeats. Its unsecured debt so forgiving gets CCS companies some payments over none. Suzi Ormann has advised deadbeats on this for many years now. But keep in mind the amount they forgive is taxable income for the deadbeats to pay taxes on. The golden rule :” Pay the balance every month and CC companies will treat you like a king

25 posted on 07/08/2009 7:14:02 PM PDT by sickoflibs (Socialist Conservatives: "'Big government is free because tax cuts pay for it'")
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To: Irish Eyes

I dont see them lowering interest rates for those with bad credit, unless cutting off future credit(purchases) completely is a condition.


26 posted on 07/08/2009 7:23:24 PM PDT by sickoflibs (Socialist Conservatives: "'Big government is free because tax cuts pay for it'")
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To: JoeProBono

Its time to reign in the usury laws. For a person with good credit the interest rate should not be over 15 percent.


27 posted on 07/08/2009 8:13:58 PM PDT by ColdSteelTalon (Light is fading to shadow, and casting its shroud over all we have known...)
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To: rabscuttle385; Abathar; Abcdefg; Abram; Abundy; akatel; albertp; AlexandriaDuke; Alexander Rubin; ..



Libertarian ping! Click here to get added or here to be removed or post a message here!
(View past Libertarian pings here)
28 posted on 07/08/2009 9:06:19 PM PDT by bamahead (Few men desire liberty; most men wish only for a just master. -- Sallust)
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To: sickoflibs
Pay the balance every month and CC companies will treat you like a king ” Not always.

Interesting about forgiving the debt, had never heard about until lately. If people can not pay but their income level has changed drastically is that a good thing for them? Sounds as if it would help them out, even if it would be taxed as income.

29 posted on 07/08/2009 11:07:40 PM PDT by Irish Eyes
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To: Irish Eyes

I have very high credit rating and pay balance off every month and even get the reward points checks for using the card for everything. I was weeks late with a payment once and simply + nicely asked them to credit me back the fee and interest they billed me and they did without question. That is because those like me have all the power over the Cc companies. Now the millions of suckers who use credit cards to buy things they cant afford, have no power and so are the whiners.

If a deadbeat has nothing saved and stops paying the minimum there is nothing the CC companies can do but negotiate. It’s called unsecured debt unlike a home equity loan.

All the so called ‘free market conservatives’ here that are whining like democrats about CC companies being mean should loan their OWN money out to unsecured deadbeats. But they probably cant because they probably have huge balances themselves which is why they are complaining.

Actually I think credit was made too easy the past decade and lured those in that it shouldnt had, creating those ‘deadbeats’ I kid about above. Sadly the Obama CC bill is the best thing Washington has done on it because it will make getting easy credit low interest rates up front harder to get.


30 posted on 07/09/2009 4:54:30 AM PDT by sickoflibs (Socialist Conservatives: "'Big government is free because tax cuts pay for it'")
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To: JoeProBono

FYI, the plan for blue tooth was to make credit card carriers more vulnerable to purchases in malls. You pass by a store and the blue tooth card transmits data to the stores.
When you go in, they wanted to have your purchasing history available to “assist” store clerks in selling you items that you may desire based upon past buying.

It was also supposed to offer the “convenience” of allowing you to pass out of the store with your purchase without checking out. The charge would be placed on your card as you exited the store with the merchandise.

Ain’t technology great?


31 posted on 07/09/2009 10:24:41 AM PDT by Munz ("We're all here for you OK? It's a circle of love" Rham Emanuel)
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To: ColdSteelTalon
Some states don't have usury laws. And I'm not convinced it's a good thing as it leads to a sort of subsidy to those which do have them by those which don't.

Credit issuers should be allowed to charge whatever they please for their product, regulated only as to things which are truly predatory.

If the supply of available credit is down the price will go up naturally, and regulating it down to below market price is not a proper function of government. Whether or not you buy it should be entirely your decision and one state forcing a subsidy out of the residents of others is just twisted. Likewise to the US government forcing a subsidy to consumers out of the suppliers of credit.

Here is a case where the power to regulate interstate commerce can and should be put to proper use IMO, but of course they are getting it wrong as usual.

32 posted on 07/09/2009 12:59:27 PM PDT by Clinging Bitterly (He must fail.)
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To: JoeProBono
So they know I buy the cheesy double beef burrito at Taco Bell but buy the giant drink at the corner store where it's only 99 cents.

Takes me two extra minutes to do it that way but it's pretty good wages when you think about it. They should probably increase my credit limit.

33 posted on 07/09/2009 1:13:28 PM PDT by Clinging Bitterly (He must fail.)
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To: Clinging Bitterly
Credit issuers should be allowed to charge whatever they please for their product, regulated only as to things which are truly predatory.

Well I would agree except that they jack your interest rate way up if you make any mistakes. They use any excuse they can come up with to set your interest rate to 30 percent.

fair profit is OK but any rate over 15 percent is predatory. Its funny they will charge you a high rate but raise your credit limit. They claim that the interest rates are punitive but they keep raising your limit.

I think its time to cap rates on credit cards. People with credit rating over 700 are getting bonked. for no real reason.

34 posted on 07/09/2009 6:42:56 PM PDT by ColdSteelTalon (Light is fading to shadow, and casting its shroud over all we have known...)
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To: ColdSteelTalon

15% is predatory? Where do you come up with this stuff? BTW, if you don’t like it, don’t use their product. Or, is that too extreme, Comrad? I wish they would cap interest rates at 5%. That way only the deserving would even get credit. How’s that for a solution?


35 posted on 07/09/2009 6:45:35 PM PDT by ItisaReligionofPeace
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To: ColdSteelTalon

15% is predatory? Where do you come up with this stuff? BTW, if you don’t like it, don’t use their product. Or, is that too extreme, Comrad? I wish they would cap interest rates at 5%. That way only the deserving would even get credit. How’s that for a solution?


36 posted on 07/09/2009 6:45:39 PM PDT by ItisaReligionofPeace
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To: ItisaReligionofPeace
if you don’t like it, don’t use their product

Now now now, you know as well as I do that is easier said than done, once the credit card companies suck you in. All someone has to do is lose their job or hit a heavy expense too. And yes it should be a law that people who have bad credit should not have a credit card. Thats what people are paying for too. To cover the losses from the banks bad lending decisions.

Comrade? I am a veteran and fought the communists don't call me one or even allude to it. You sound like someone that is just looking to fight.

37 posted on 07/09/2009 6:53:35 PM PDT by ColdSteelTalon (Light is fading to shadow, and casting its shroud over all we have known...)
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To: ColdSteelTalon
If the contract you agree to says they can raise the rate, they can raise the rate. If it doesn't allow for that and they want to raise it, they'll often do it anyway but permit you to opt out by agreeing to no longer use the card. Either way it's a thing to which you agree before you pay.

15% seems a bit much right now, but lots of folks gladly pay it when it's the only credit they can get. Consumer credit rates increase as the number of defaults rise too, as we who pay take on the debt of the ones who don't through the interest charged for the credit products we choose.

That's just the way it is.

The only thing that would come of regulation and arbitrary maximum rates is a limiting of available credit - but you can limit the rate yourself to anything you want by just not using credit if you don't like the cost.

38 posted on 07/09/2009 8:49:01 PM PDT by Clinging Bitterly (He must fail.)
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To: Clinging Bitterly
Did you know that many card agreements now have a clause that says that if you just stop using the card and close the account they will charge you the maximum rate? They are doing it. And I am sorry but that should be illegal. Its enslavement. And the funny part is if the banks go under you and I have to cover the banks losses.

Thats what the TARP is. and soon there will be a TARP for credit card debt.

I favor a law that forces those using credit cards to pay them off earlier but at a high interest rate they are never going to get them paid off. The card companies have all the advantages. And if the America people are eventually going to have to pay for it I say we regulate them. We have a right to if we are going to be on the hook for their losses.

39 posted on 07/09/2009 10:49:31 PM PDT by ColdSteelTalon (Light is fading to shadow, and casting its shroud over all we have known...)
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To: Steely Tom
The leftists who write for American Public Radio's Marketplace forgot to explain how the credit card companies force people to buy their drinks on credit instead of with cash.

Or they're pointing out why you should pay cash.

40 posted on 07/09/2009 11:01:47 PM PDT by Doe Eyes
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