down with Wamu (Washington Mutual) Bank Robbery

[bwdizzle]

How Your Credit Card Interest Rate Can Go “Through the Roof”
for No Apparent Reason

Another trick of Washington Mutual is to induce you to take advantage of a complimentary offer of (extremely low interest) for a year. At the end of that time if the offer was not paid back in full the balance will then have an interest rate of 24% or more and can't be paid off until all the lower interest balances are paid first.
Another device will surprise you if you pay off the entire amount you will still be charged interest for the next two billing periods.
Its time to fight back, gather together and start a class action suite to reverse the law that legalizes such reprehensible action.

[bwdizzle]

Buried in the fine print of the credit card terms and agreements, a universal default clause generally states that if you default (are late paying your bills) to the credit card issuer or any other lender the interest rate on the credit card could be raised. Banks that utilize the universal default clause periodically check credit reports of their cardholders. If a credit score is lowered for any reason—late payments, high debts on loans, etc.—then the universal default can be activated. Yes, even if you have a perfect bill-paying record with the card issuer.

According to Linda Sherry of Consumer Action, more banks than ever use universal default policies to increase interest rates based on their customer’s credit performance with other creditors. “Banks seem to be saying that if there is even a shadow of a doubt that a cardholder might not pay, they are going to get a premium on their money while they still can.”

“We (Consumer Action) believe the real purpose of these policies is to maximize revenue at the expense of those who are least able to afford it.

After you have checked everything you can including your credit report and find nothing wrong and you request an explanation for the increased interest this is the type of letter you may receive, the one below came from Washington Mutual (WAMU).

[Nbadan]

...I'm sensing that this topic is gonna devolve into another predatory-lending versus blame-the-borrower thread..

[bwdizzle]

Thank you for your recent correspondence regarding the Important Notice of Changes to Your Account Agreement you recently received.
You requested information regarding the reason(s) your Account terms were changed.

We decided to adjust your Account Agreement to reflect changes in the legal and regulatory environment, and standardize our business practices.
- We adjusted your Returned Payment Fee to reflect the compe ive environment and to better fit the different ways our customers manage their accounts.
- We adjusted your Default APR to reflect the compe ive environment and to better fit the different ways our customers manage their accounts.

We hope that we have addressed your concerns. If you have any further questions regarding this matter, please call us at the customer service number listed on your statement, or write to us at the following address:

Washington Mutual

Once again, thank you for contacting us regarding your Account.

[bwdizzle]

highway robbery these horror stories just shows you how desperate these banks are and how close we are to a melt down even possible another great depression except the rich won't be effected just everybody else under

[Nbadan]

With the new bankruptcy laws, what we are looking at is a form of indentured servitude....you used to be able to wait out bad debt, now it stays with you like Republicans..

[bwdizzle]

very true we the taxpayer are going to feel the bailouts of our government and it's going hit our pockets