Aug 25th, 2007
Credit for Bottom Feeders from Bottom Feeders
Now that I know a little something about credit, and have none, it’s interesting to look at credit card solicitations. Now that I’ve been officially bankrupt a while and securing my place on the bottom of the credit chain, I’m starting to get lots of solicitations from the bottom feeders of the credit industry.
One solicitation I started getting right away was from a credit company that offered me an unbelievable line of credit, and not a bad interest rate. As if not seeing Visa or Mastercard weren’t enough to tip me off, the catch was that I could only buy stuff directly from them.
The solicitation I got a while ago from First Premier Bank was somewhat encouraging until I read the Schumer Box. In case you didn’t know, the Schumer box is the table that all credit card companies have to use to disclose all their fees in plain terms. It’s named after my wonderful Senator, Chuck Schumer.
Anyway, the box had a poopload of extra fees listed. After the encouraging 9.9% interest rate, there were some fees I’d never seen before. First, an account set-up fee of $29; a $95.00 program fee; an annual fee of $48.00, and a $72 Annual participation fee. So for a mere $244, I could have a credit card with a limit of… are you ready for this? $250!!
I looked at the fine print outside of the Schumer Box to explain where they got off charging all these fees. The account set-up fee, the Program Fee, and the Participation Fee are all “a condition of extending credit to you.” It’s kind of like the enterprising fellow at the gallows selling you a very nice rope to hang yourself with.
Admittedly, this card offer isn’t as reprehensible as others. For us bottom feeders, there’s no such thing as free credit. This card provdes the ability to rebuild credit, but at a very high price. The moment you accept the card, you have a balance of $244. Did the folks at First Premier forget that we’re broke? Of course not. They want us to pay lots of interest in addition to those first fees.
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Technorati Tags: bankrupt, credit industry, Visa, Mastercard, First Premier Bank, Schumer Box, Chuck Schumer