(PRWEB) October 18, 2006 -- Annual Award for tricksters in banking get tarred and feathered with the CreditCard.org Lemon Award. Halloween Week is when nominees are awarded the annual prize. In contention for CreditCard.org Lemon Award are...
(1) First time offense gets LIFE at Providian.
Each time you default... we may increase the APRs on your account up to a maximum of the Default APR (31.99%). Providian has a couple of class action lawsuits (on that topped 400 million). If big tobacco started a credit card company, they'd call it Providian. If there's a poster child for CreditCard.org Lemon Award nomination, it'd be Providian, the first bank ever to charge you for a credit card credit line.
(2) 0 to 29.99 in 2 hours
"Late is late", said the Bank of America customer service rep, based in Colorado Springs CO, referring to the fact that the payment posted the day it was due but was hours late. Each time your minimum payment is late (i.e., not received by 2 p.m., ET, on its Payment Due Date), or the account balance is over-the-credit-limit, we may increase each of your account's Variable APRs up to the Default APR of 29.99. Bank of America was penalized in a class action suit for "rolling back" payment due dates according to court filings in Delaware. They could squeeze more late fees by rolling back the due date time to 10am and they were caught and penalized by the FTC. Bank of America, this is your first CreditCard.org Lemon Award nomination.
(3) Best Buy Credit Card
Buying the extended warrantee with a Best Buy credit card is, at best, an opportunity to argue for months whether Best Buy will honor the initial promise of warrantee. Do yourself a favor and avoid the countless complaints by using an Amex for the purchase saying no to the extended warrantee. Note: if you do buy it and have a hard time (surprise, they don't like paying warrantee claims), post your experience at CreditCard.org so that others can see, share and learn from your negative experience
(4) Reverse Mortgages
There's the saying, "A fool and his money are quickly separated". Well there's a theme that the AARP is harking is that, a fool and his house are quickly separated too. Reverse mortgages are also called Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) and they are wrought with traps.
(5) College Credit Cards at the Low Rate of 23.15%
There's a product being hawked on college campuses. A Visa with an APR of 28.15. The brand they call themselves right now is Clout Visa and "College Credit Card Corporation" gives out t-shirts to get people to fill out applications. Clout Visa, for charging a rate that's five times higher than the prime rate, you get a CreditCard.org Lemon Award nomination.
(6) Annual Credit Report dot com
Annual Credit Report.com tricks consumers into buying credit score. The original spirit of the site is to comply with FTC mandate that consumers be allowed to view their credit report once a year. What has happened is that Annual Credit Report.com has turned into a nice tidy profit center when adds are blasted and traffic is redirected to sell consumers their credit score. Way to go Big Bureaus!, it shows that the millions of dollars spent on lobbying DOES work. AnnualCreditReport.com turns a legal requirement into a lead generating site and that deserves a CreditCard.org Lemon Award nomination.
(7) Discover Credit Card on campus
According to a October 2, 2006 article in USA Today, student were presented a credit card application without a disclosure box. US credit states in clear terms that consumers must be presented a "Schumer" box that outlines cost, terms and penalties. Discover for breaking the law, you get a CreditCard.org Lemon Award nomination.
CreditCard.org is still collecting Lemon Award Nominations for Bad Banking. Award recipients will be publicized October 31, 2006.
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Lemon Awards are the perfect name. Banks are crazy aggressive trying to get my money. Thx for the article
ReplyDeleteThis article is featured in this month's Carnival of Future Millionaires! http://howtomakeamilliondollars.blogspot.com/2006/10/carnival-of-future-millionaires-up.html#links
ReplyDelete#6 is somewhat ironic considering the google served ads on creditcard.org.
ReplyDeleteWish I would have seen this about 5 years ago. I had a clout card and it really messed up my credit. I was a freshman in college. Now I can't even find a website for them to contact them. Also had a best buy card and providian. Guess I really know how to pick them.
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