This is interesting… Apparently the IRS has changed their stance, and the fees associated with paying your taxes with a credit card are now deductible. Details are available from the always excellent Fairmark.com.
Here are the 2010 federal income tax rates.
Most everyone knows that it’s important to check your credit report on a regular basis. But how do you fix a credit report error if you find one? Dispute it, of course.
Here is the contact info for the three major credit reporting bureaus, including the mailing address, phone number, and a link to their online credit report dispute form:
Equifax Information Services, LLC
P.O. Box 740256
Atlanta,GA 30374
Phone: (800) 685-1111
Online dispute form: link
Experian
P.O. Box 2104
Allen, TX 75013-0949
Phone: (888) 397-3742
Online dispute form: link
TransUnion Corp.
P.O. Box 2000
Springfield, PA 19022-2000
Phone: (800) 888-4213
Online dispute form: link
Looks like Bank of America is jumping on the rate-increasing bandwagon…
“Starting with June account statements, any credit-card customer who carries a balance and has an interest rate below 10% will see his or her rate jump into double-digit territory.”
According to notices that cardholders have been receiving, it looks like the sub-10% rates will be jumping to just shy of 14% (possibly higher, I can only go on what’s been reported thus far).
Presumably you’ll be able to opt out of these changes, but that will likely involve agreeing to close your account. Rock, meet hard place.
As a followup to my earlier articles about reduced credit limits, Smart Money reports that some card issuers are actually reducing credit limits below the current balance, thereby triggering over-limit fees/penalties.
While the Federal Reserve will ultimately require that issuers give cardholders 45 days notice before reducing a credit line to the point at which it would trigger penalties, these restrictions won’t go into effect until the summer of 2010. Your best defense is thus to keep a close eye on your accounts, and to call your creditor and ask for any unfair fees to be reversed.
Good news for Chase customers that got socked with a their new monthly service charge… According to recent reports, they’ll stop charging this fee in April, and will be refunding previous months’ charges.
“Beginning in April, and based on customer feedback, Chase will stop charging the $10 monthly service charge and credit the service charges billed to date,” said Chase spokeswoman, Stephanie Jacobson.
That’s the good news, especially for those that still have a low rate balance transfer. The bad news is that Chase won’t be rolling the increased minimum payments (from 2% to 5% of the existing balance) that they instituted for these same customers.
“Our desire is to have these balances paid back in a reasonable period of time,” Jacobson said. “The minimum payment due will remain the 5% of their new balance.”
American Express is offering its card members double Membership Rewards points on gas and groceries from March 15, 2009 through March 15, 2010. The promo is capped at $1,000 of eligible purchases per month, but that’s a lot of gas groceries, so the cap should discourage you.
You can signup on the AmEx website or by calling 1-800-794-1308 and providing the promo code 139150001. As many of you know, we use the AmEx Blue Cash rewards card, so we won’t benefit from this promo. But if you’re currently earning points from AmEx, then you sign up right away.
As I’ve noted in the past, credit utilization has a major effect on your credit score. It should thus come as no surprise that recent moves by credit card issuers to reduce the credit limits of certain customers is negatively influencing credit scores.
According to a recent report in the Seattle Times, approximately 45% of US banks reduced credit limits during the 4th quarter of 2008. The article also highlighted the case of a 58 year old construction company owner in San Diego who saw his credit score drop from 760 to 650 as a result of the changes.
If you’re faced with a similar situation, you should pay down your balance as quickly as possible. You might also consider a balance transfer to a card from a different issuer. If you play your cards right (no pun intended), you might even be able to reduce your interest rate.
According to a recent report, Maryland could become the first state in the country to outlaw retroactive changes in credit card interest rates. The propose legislation would “prohibit card companies that change their rates from applying the new rate to debt a consumer already has incurred.”
Card issuers often adjust (i.e., increase) interest rates in response to missed payments or negative changes on your credit report. Unfortunately, even if the cardholder objects to the increase and cancels their card, they’re still on the hook for the higher rate on their existing balance.
Assuming that the Maryland bills passes, it will go into effect this summer, a year earlier than federal legislation that’s aimed to do the same thing. Not surprisingly, the Maryland Bankers Association has vowed to fight the legislation.
Every once in awhile I run across MyFICO discount codes, so I thought I’d start compiling them here in one place. For starters, here are two codes that give you 20-30% off your purchase:
As always, they also offer a free 30 day trial on their ScoreWatch service, which gives you free access to your credit reports as well as your real FICO score.
Have you ever heard of Credit Karma? If not, you should check them out. They offer free credit score tracking. No, it’s not a real FICO score — for that, you’ll need to try a service like MyFICO ScoreWatch — but it still gives you a sense for where you stand. And like I said above, it’s free.
Setting up an account was very simple, though they do ask for some fairly sensitive information including your SSN. This makes sense, as they need to access your TransUnion credit record in order to estimate your score. Since it’s free, they don’t ask for any sort of payment information, and you don’t have to remember to cancel anything.
In terms of accuracy, they seem to do pretty well. In fact, my “official” FICO score is just short of 800 and Credit Karma had me pegged at 777. Another advantage of their service is that they track your score over time and provide you with a graph of the resulting data.
If you’d rather get a “real” FICO score then, like I said above, you should check out the free ScoreWatch trial from MyFICO. But if a reasonably accurate estimate will suffice, then Credit Karma is a great alternative.
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