Help May Be on the Way for Credit Cardholders

If some legislators have their way, credit card companies will no longer be able to gouge consumers with exorbitant fees resulting from unfair practices such as double-cycle billing, surreptitiously changing payment due-dates, charging repeated fees for over-limit violation, and raising interest rates at any time for any reason. These were among the numerous "tricks and traps," as one congressional witness put it, used by credit card companies that were discussed during hearings held in Washington by the Subcommittee on Financial Institutions and Consumer Credit on Thursday, March 13^th.

"In recent years, the playing field between card companies and cardholders has become very one-sided," stated Subcommittee Chairwoman Carolyn B. Maloney (D-NY) who introduced the consumer protection bill, along with Barney Frank (D-MA), dubbed H.R.5244 - "The Credit Cardholder's Bill of Rights: Providing New Protections for Consumers." Maloney's legislation aims to end abusive credit card industry practices and provide important consumer protections to credit cardholders.