We all know that we pay more for purchases made with a credit card, right?  Sure, there is the outrageous interest that the credit card companies charge for the convenience of plastic over cash.  But what if a growing trend of discounts for cash catches on nationwide and credit card purchases become even more expensive [...]

Millions of Americans have been affected by identity theft.  Identity theft happens when someone else uses YOUR personal information to commit a fraud in your name.   Your personal information can be your name, your social security number, or anything that identifies you as YOU.    Identity thieves can do an incredible amount of damage before they [...]

Just when you thought you had heard it all in the world of credit card rip-offs, debt collection and bankruptcy, something interesting happened in the office last week.  I met with two different potential clients who stated that their credit cards were cancelled, despite the clients having zero balances on the credit lines and decent credit [...]

Phishing is a criminally fraudulent process of attempting to acquire sensitive information including passwords, credit card numbers, and the like.    It typically occurs when you receive an email that appears to be from your bank or an online service (think PayPal or eBay) instructing you to click on a link to provide information to verify [...]

The financial crisis in the mortgage market is causing a tightening of available credit in the credit card arena.  As falling real estate prices decrease home equity borrowing, more consumers are turning to credit cards.  Investment firm Merrill Lynch reports an 8 per cent increase in revolving credit over last year, the highest increase in [...]

Jay Fleischman, an expert at making credit card banks behave themselves, recently posted an article describing another win for the consumer.  In How Long Does A Creditor Have To Sue On A Debt? Jay describes how the foreign law provisions of the credit card agreement were enforced against Captital One Bank. 
It seems that the [...]

As if the current credit crisis wasn’t enough, Americans are turning toward what I like to call unconventional financing more and more these days.  Just 12 short years ago in 1996, Americans were only in 500 billion dollars worth of credit card debt.  Now, only 12 years later, we have doubled that number with an [...]

In Texas, a business can not penalize you for paying with a credit card. Businesses that add a surcharge to those who pay by credit card might be violating provisions of the Texas Finance Code.
However, businesses can discount the regular retail price of an item for consumers who pay cash. If you believe a [...]

When applying for credit, a consumer has to be very wary of what will happen upon default.  I know that only a lawyer would want to consider the possibility of default before signing a contract, but consumers today face a whole host of remedies available to the creditors in case of default.  Arbitration is the [...]

I read a very disturbing article this morning which I do not care to cite to.  The article discussed how one of the hottest stocks right now is a company that buys bad debt from credit card companies like Visa, Mastercard, Discover, Capital One, HSBC, Providian/ WaMu and American Express at deeply discounted rates, and [...]