All credit companies wait for customers to carry a balance so they can hit them up with a high interest rate to make some money they lost from all the customers who filed BK on them.

Actually BofA earns very very little off of my accounts LOL. I am not going to pay any bank interest higher then they will pay me in a savings account. When BofA sends out a 0% for 6 months to a year, sure I use those, other then that it is pay in full every month.

The checking account is free, money market account is free, cashier checks are free, notary service is free, they send me my printed checks for free and I have a free safe deposit box along with free bill pay.

Ok, for me BofA is a great bank. BUT when you read the posts on what they pull on people who can not pay off their credit cards every month it turns my stomach, and considering I am a Medical Examiner not much will turn my stomach

I know they are not making a killing on me, but they more then make up for it on other customers

Porgy, you should be happy that BofA doesn't decrease credit lines. Make sure they don't read your posts here or else your going to wonder why your credit card got declined lol

I guess I should not pick on BofA, they are no differient then any other large bank out there. They all rate the same. It is more then a business for them, they are NOT happy unless they pull every cent you have out of you. I think it goes beyond a business. :

You guys simply cannot have the cake and eat it too.

THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH CREDIT CARDS

Even though this is not right, I had to fall on the floor laughing when I saw this.

It is only right that some people rip of credit card companies and banks by declaring bankruptcy since the majority are being ripped off by paying 24% or higher APR on their unpaid balance. You guys simply cannot have the cake and eat it too.

THE ROAD TO HELL IS PAVED WITH CREDIT CARDS.

I understand Porgy...I have explained to people why there APR went up...You may call our banking system a mafia...but the BKO laws changed because of the bad apples in the system. I know a few people who ripped off the bank for thousands and then reported Bankruptcy...and paid a BIG FAT ZERO for there time. Would you loan some one money and they not pay you back and advise another friend to loan that person again? This is exactly why we have all these sub-primed cards out there. 20 years ago only the rich or people with outstanding credit got credit. When I worked for GEMB they were getting ripped off left and right, banks can only lose so uch money then its hell to pay for future borrowers.

BofA hmmm, they tried to s***w me over with the Visa Signature Card. You have to have a fico of 750 or so, ok, so I went for it, NO pre set spending limit. You can spend on it whatever you want, right?

OK, I go spend $100 on it, then quess what? It shows on all 3 of my credit reports as MAXED out , they only report what you owe out for the month as maximum credit.

Bank of Mafia is in business to s***w you out of every dime you have. WHY? ok, lets see, hmmm, Lets give a card to a guy with a top fico score with no spending limit at 3.9%, lets then hope he spends $50,000 on it so we can report him as maxed out to the credit bureaus. Now the poor sap cant pay it back in just one month, OH MY, he is maxed out at TU, EX and EQ so his FICO just went down to 710, lets raise the poor saps rate to 30%

LEGALIZED mafia is all they are. Sorry Eric heheheh, not directed at you

Who says the mafia is gone? dont be surprised if BofMafia threatens to break your legs if you opt out of the 30% interest rate :

And I am NOT saying they are better then any other bank. Chase, Citibank all try to do the same thing. When I was 20 years old they had a maximum any bank could charge you by law and it was 19.9% . Banks have alot of clout in Wash DC, so they had that law overturned.

The banks then went back to Washington and had the bankruptcy law changed to what it is today so you can not file and have your debt discharged anymore. MBNA who is now BofMafia paid 9 BILLION dollars to politicians to get the new bankruptcy laws changed to what they are today. Try to tell me that they are NOT the mafia, I am convinced that they are.

Sorry Eric. I know many people that they raised interest rates on. Doctors, Lawyers etc. Actually everyone I know has had some type of interest hike in the last 6 months from BofMafia. Most went from 9.9% to 25%.

When you say only 6% of customers had a rate increase, I find that hard to believe. They have not raised me yet. But then again, I owe out ZERO on all my charge cards right now.

I have been using my debit cards until my new mortgage closes to get the lowest rate on my mortgage

I find your explanation rather long winded and convoliuted; why not you just tell them the honest truth that them to pay full payment every month. If you lose your job for stating the obvious truith, you will be my hero.

Yes its true about the interest rates...Ive had to take manager calls regarding this numerous times. We sent out change of terms letters in Jan advising certain customers that we were changing the terms. Now the customer can send us a letter rejecting those terms, and keep the same rate as LONG as they dont USE the card. Now over 2007 we raised only 6% of our cardholders interest. That means 94% of our cardholders kept the same rate or went lower than what they were paying in 2006. Also the reason that the rates are going up for certain customers are that most of the customers I talked to were up to there limit. Yes they were making there minimum payments on time BUT when your only paying your minimum and making maybe a $30 or $40 gas purchase or something, and then making another MINIMUM payment you will never pay this account off. It raises a flag- a RISK FLAG. Some people are a broken leg from losing everything. My speculation on this is that BofA wants to speed up these payments from these customers. Its not neccesarily a money issue here because the customers do have the right to decline the higher interest rate and keep the current rate they have. I also believe BofA wants these people off the books to put more profitable customers into play. The reason I say this is because most of the customers who have the rate change have fixed 5.9% to 12.99%. These customers are charging on the accounts because they are up to there limits (which by the way ALOT of the banks money is generated) and there not being charged alot of interest. Alot of these customers have had there FICOs lowered also credit to debt ratio is not good either. My advise to these customers is to write the letter rejecting these terms and try to pay this account off as fast as possible. Hope this blog helps.

Eric from BofA

[Doing everything right means pay in full every month - then you will be immune to whatever nonsense that banks throw at you.

I agree, however, with banks doing things like this it will put many people in default at rates they can not afford and if you times that by millions of customers, hmmm. This can put our country in a recession very quickly

Wow! I don't have a BofA card, but I hope people who do are paying attention. I'm one of those who tend to coast along and think that as long as I'm doing everything right, I won't be affected by high rates. This proves otherwise!

With people racking up charges on their credit cards and then fliing BK's, I'm not suprised by this at all. Interest rates are where banks make their money.