OT: Who helps the little guy?, Against bastards like Bank Of America Options

[anthony]

Credit is a tool. Use it wisely or irresponsibly. It's one's choice.

couldn't close the account because I didn't have $7000. I didn't really "Agree" any more than a mugee agrees to hand over his wallet to a mugger. One of the things they change was my purchase intrest rate, which went from around 18% to 29.24%.

You could have not agreed to the new terms. That locks you in to the old terms and you must keep paying monthly and it also means that you can't use the card for new purchases.

My unsollicited advice:

Find an accelerated way to dig yourself out of the $6K hole - 2nd job, give up the 914 hobby for a while, cut expenses, work overtime, whatever. 20% interest on $6K is $1200/year.

My other advice is to always pay bills online. Don't rely on checks. Electronic payments are much more reliable.

Personally I've set up automatic monthly minimum payments on my two active credit cards. That means that if I accidentally miss the credit card bill at least a minimum payment gets made and I avoid late fees. I also have automated monthly payments for my mortgage. And I find this to be a huge time saver.

[Sammy]

Who helps the little guy?
I'll take a shot, "cut your credit cards!" That's as helpful as I can get.

I have been with B of A for many years and have had no problems whatsoever with them. In fact I reccomend them.
Of course I also never let my credit card dept get above $500 or so.

[JPB]

Just remeber that mister Smith and Wesson must not help you in this situation. You need to take it in personaly!!!

(IMG:style_emoticons/default/beer.gif) I was like 40K in dept a few years back from the divorce, took it like a prison inmate, and now am freeeeeeeeeee; thank God! You can do it!

[snflupigus]

I also work for Chase in AZ.... 0% for 12 months. 3% bal trans fee. depending on credit, you should have no problems moving everything over...

B of A is like every other bank... none are much different... they cater to people with money, and make money off people without it as much as with it.

Again, you could have opted not to agree to the new terms effectively closing the card, fixing your marginal rate and the only downside would have been that you would no longer have the available credit on it. I just did this with Providian who was bought by Washington Mutual. sucks to know now but....

[gklinger]

I've been a BofA customer for close to 20 years with no problems. Obviously I'm in the minority here... I rarely visit a branch since I have direct deposit, and I do all my banking and bill paying online. Their online bill payment service is second to none, since they don't remove the funds from your account until the date you specified as the due date, unlike most others. I'll second what others have said, get the CC balance paid off however you can, and keep it that way. Don't close the account if you can help it though, as the long term history will help you if you apply for credit in the future.