[cowboyindian]

Hello,

I opened an account with Chase and had a high limit, which I used. After I was using over half of my available credit they increased my interest rate from 7.99 to 23.99, though I paid the balance down further they further increased my rate to its current 29.99. My behavior vis a vis the card, which I have now had for about 3 years, has been to make more than the minimum payments, and to make them on time. There is one exception where I made the payment electronically 1 day late, which was a few months ago. Because my good handling of the debt is important to me, this being late was especialy irritating because I called the company on the day the payment was due and did not want to pay the 14.95 same day payment fee. The woman on the phone told me that if I paid the next day and avoided the fee, she would ensure that my payment history would remain unblemished. She was mistaken. Anyway, I have called the company to ask why they are doing this and the exchange goes like this. "We raise rates when you are late". I am not late. "We raise rates depending on your credit score." I monitor my score and it has not significantly changed in the past year, and where it has, it has improved. "You need to make the minimum payment....etc. So I am not sure what is going on here. My credit score is 672 at this moment and I am wondering if anyone has some good advice concerning getting them to budge. I feel that they made a promise and then broke it for no good reason, how can I plan my life when they keep arbitrarily raising the rate? Where is the good faith here? I am aware that I need to pay the balance down and am involved in that process. Owing 9500 and paying it off quickly is difficult when you are also covering $3000 in vig. Can a credit card company be sued? Shall I just deal with it? I would like to open a new card, but do not want to apply and then not be able to get a balance transfer offer large enough to cover the debt, as applying for credit lowers your score as does having too much credit open at one time and I do not want to give this company any more fodder for their bad faith dealings. Thanks for the advice. Also, what is the deal with credit card contracts. I promise to pay my debt and they promise to loan me money at a certain interest rate. How can they just change the terms on me without further consideration on my part? There is a fine print statement that says they can change the rates at any time, but clearly I would not have opened the account if the interest was was "what we feel like making it" instead of "this, which will remain unless you behave badly." Again, thanks for any useful advice.

[Mr. Knowitall]

Consider either getting a personal loan to pay off the credit card, or getting a new card (or cards) with a promotional rate for balance transfers and transferring your balance to that card (or cards). Or even try telling Chase that you'll be transferring your balance if they can't give you a reasonable interest rate - sometimes credit card companies respond to that. They usually jack your rate through the roof only if they believe you don't have an alternative, because obviously people who have an option to pay 7-8% interest aren't going to pay 20%+.