Credit Card Blog

Okay, all credit card fraud is pretty heinous. But some thieves go over the top. Here are some of the most outrageous cases of credit card fraud from July 2009:

El Paso, TX: Jose Adrian Castillo was arrested and charged with fraud. His method? Playing on the sympathies of elderly women by telling them he was dying of cancer. Of course, the ladies couldn’t deny Castillo’s dying requests, so they let the con man borrow their credit cards. He ran up tabs as high as $25,000 on these ill-gotten cards before police finally caught up to him.

Vermilion, OH: Jason Truxel was the victim of identity theft. Someone had used his personal information to open up lines of credit, obtain a mortgage, and even receive tax refunds. Imagine Truxel’s shock when he learned that the fraudster was his own dad! Sadly, statistics show that parents frequently steal their kids’ identities.

Cross Lanes, WV: A computer programmer named Martin Bowling decided to go on an identity-stealing spree. His target? The subscribers of ‘Woodcrafters Magazine’. He made off with $4,500 and purchased – among other things – an automatic litter box.

Remember: identity theft and credit card fraud happen every day. You can protect yourself by using Smart Cards, keeping your passwords safe, and never clicking on links contained in e-mails – no matter how official they seem.

If you’ve decided to move your balance from one credit card to a new credit card with better terms, you should think about what to do with your old card. Cutting it up with scissors isn’t going to cancel the account or ensure you can wipe your hands clean of responsibility from the old account. Here are some tips for handling an old credit card when you get a new one:

• If you haven’t moved an entire balance from the old card to the new card, call the credit card company to obtain the accurate pay off balance. Make the final payment, then determine if you want to leave the account open as available credit or close it completely.
• If you’ve decided to close the account, listen to the offers presented to you by the representatives when you call to cancel the account. They will most likely attempt to keep your business with better offers and deals. If they don’t offer anything better than the new card, or the offer just isn’t that great – continue to cancel the account and ask for a written confirmation that the account has been canceled.
• I f you decide to keep your old account open but unused – don’t forget to pay attention to the statements that come in the mail. Even though you won’t have a payment due, keep an eye on it to make sure that no one has compromised the account and made unauthorized transactions.

When it comes to living beyond one’s means, Americans are legendary. But that doesn’t mean we’re alone. In fact, the Financial Times has recently reported that Europeans are going through pretty much the same debt fallout that Americans are experiencing, due to many of the same factors – namely, overspending and easy credit.

Now European lenders are preparing for a tsunami of debt default similar to the one that hit American banks last Fall. Some estimates expect that 7% of Europe’s consumer debt will go bad. With total consumer debt topping $2.5 trillion, that’s a lot of default waiting to happen.

The same article reveals that households in the UK have a higher percentage of debt to disposable income than US consumers. Still, debt default in the UK is expected to be about half that of America.

If you have a heavy debt load and think you might be in danger of defaulting on your credit cards, call your company’s card services division and let them know what’s going on. They might set you up with a payment plan that will help keep your payments at a manageable level.

It’s no secret that credit card companies are using data profiling to decide which cardholders are risky and which ones aren’t. What do your spending habits say about you? Let’s scrutinize an imaginary credit card bill through the eyes of a credit card company.

Alcohol: If you’re spending a lot of time partying, credit card companies might take your alcohol consumption as a sign of stress – due to a job loss, too much debt, or a failing marriage. (Those are all considered qualities of high-risk cardholders, and your credit limit could be slashed because of them.)

Bills & Taxes: Paying other bills and even your income tax with your credit card is a troubling sign that you can’t come up with the money any other way.

Adult Services: Gambling and other 21+ activities don’t look good to credit card companies. These charges might be a sign that you’re trying to escape from your money woes. Surprisingly, spa services can also work against you for the same reason.

Therapy: In a trend that’s ruffled plenty of feathers, card companies are clamping down on the credit limits of people in therapy. Why? Most therapy revolves around money and marriage problems. Either of those could cause you stop paying your bills.

So what does your credit card bill say about you? It will paint a brighter picture if you can avoid putting controversial charges on your credit card.

When you see an erroneous charge on your credit card bill, your first response might be to call up your credit card company to dispute it. The good news is, you’re already taking care of your finances by keeping a watchful eye on your credit card statements. The bad news is, your credit card company might not take your side in the dispute.

To maximize your chances of success, follow these 3 tips when disputing credit card charges:

1. Make a strong case for yourself. If you can prove that the merchant violated the law or their own written contract by charging your credit card, you’ll have a better chance of success. Some charges turn out to be clauses that were hidden in the fine print of legal contracts. Needless to say, those charges aren’t typically refunded.

2. Try to work with the merchant first. They might be willing to fix the mistake and credit the charge back to you without getting the credit card company involved.

3. Know your rights and responsibilities. The Fair Credit and Billing Act protects cardholders against fraudulent charges, but you’ll need to provide documentation backing up your claim. You’ll also need to file your dispute shortly after the charge occurs.

If your credit card company does not rule in your favor, you can complain to the FTC and file a lawsuit to recover your money. If you feel that your credit card company sides with merchants much more often than it sides with you, don’t hesitate to take your business to a competitor.

Part of the new credit card rules to take place officially on July 1, 2010, include credit card statements that are less confusing and easier to read. Consumers have been complaining for years that the phrases used on their statements make it next to impossible to understand the information the statement contains and is therefore very misleading. In addition to the way content is worded, consumers have complained that critical information doesn’t appear on the statements every single month.

Improvements to the credit cards statement will include:

Key Changes in the Card Terms – Any changes must show up in the table shown at the top of every credit card statement. This table includes the interest rate, total balance owed, last month’s balance, current balance and amount of last payment. It will now show any changes including the increase of your interest rate and the date it will be effective.

Detailed Transactions- Details about each transaction that took place during the billing cycle, including a reference code, transaction date, post date, description of transaction, and amount charged for each purchase, will now appear on each monthly credit card statement.

Fees – All fees incurred during the billing cycle and how they were calculated will be included.

Interest Charges – A detailed listing of all of the interest charges during the billing cycle will be included.

Totals Year To Date- Created to show consumers how much they have spent throughout the year on fees and interest rates and must be included on all credit card monthly statements, new to the credit card changes in July 2010.

Make sure to review your credit card statements every month to watch for any changes or potential problems. The earlier you spot them, the easier they are to correct or improve.

This prank has been around awhile, but it’s an entertaining read. An individual who uses credit cards for just about all of his transactions gets very annoyed about having to sign for every last purchase. He figures no one really looks at the signature anyway, and that it serves no purpose and slows the process of paying for items by credit down unnecessarily.

He goes on to prove his point by embarking on a credit card prank in which he makes crazy “signatures” whenever he’s presented with a receipt to sign. Some of his signatures are doodles, some are drawings, some are simple marks on the paper. How many do you think he signed in this manner before getting caught? Are the purchases valid with these prank signatures on them?

Read more on the credit card signature prank.

If you’re a fan of credit card travel or dining rewards programs, you’ll want to become a member of the FlyerTalk forums. It’s an interactive community that lets people share information about rewards programs and travel perks they’ve gotten from various rewards cards.

In the forums, you can read from real people how they’ve been able to maximize their points and miles. Some people discuss credit card retention benefits – where they’ve been able to get extra rewards or points by calling a certain phone number or telling a customer service representative they planned to cancel their credit card account.

Unlike the credit card websites and blogs, this forum is made up of real people who use the various credit cards and participate in the rewards programs. The information you gain from these forums should be without bias or sales agenda, which makes it a little more trustworthy than information you find on a credit card company’s website.

You can use the community for free by creating an account. They welcome you to read the posts and get comfortable and then begin asking questions or sharing information as soon as you feel ready. While they can’t guarantee the information found on the site is 100% accurate all the time (after all, people are posting it and there is a potential for error), you can find out about some great deals, contests, and offers for reward program benefits by becoming a member.

We’ve all been warned not to carry a balance from month to month on our credit cards, and especially to avoid making minimum monthly payments. That’s because minimum payments, especially on large balances, can take half a lifetime to pay off, at which point you’ve probably paid more in interest than in capital.

The new credit card laws will compel credit card issuers to spell out just how long it will take to pay off your balance by making minimum monthly payments. While this will surely be an eye-opener for many people, there’s one group that won’t benefit from the new rules: the responsible cardholders who paid off their balances on time and in full every month.

Rather than being rewarded for their good behavior, these cardholders will suffer as interest rates and fees continue to skyrocket, and credit limits and reward programs are scaled down.

If you’re a responsible cardholder, continue to pay off your balance at the end of every month. Even if the card companies aren’t recognizing your self-control, you will maintain a good credit score – and that will come in handy in the coming days when credit isn’t as readily available as it once was.

Imagine buying a pack of cigarettes, only to find that you’ve been charged $23 quadrillion dollars! That’s the shock Josh Muszynski suffered when a billing error left his Visa card woefully over the limit.

Muszynski called Bank of America to try and sort out the error, but they could not explain why he’d been charged so much, and referred him to his card issuer, Visa. Visa, in turn, referred Muszynski back to his bank. After a day of mystery, the charge was reversed.

Unfortunately, this isn’t an isolated incident. A teenage girl was also charged $23 quadrillion after she made a purchase at a CVS store. Two men from Tennessee and Texas were also charged $23 quadrillion – one after buying cigarettes from a Memphis gas station, the other after eating at Wolfgang Puck’s Five Sixty restaurant.

Josh Muszynski joked that, upon seeing the charge, he thought someone must have stolen his card information and used it to “buy Europe”. But fraud doesn’t seem to be the issue here. Visa blames the charges on a glitch that affected some cardholders with prepaid credit cards. According to Visa, the glitch has been corrected and should not occur again.