Sat 8 Aug 2009
AMEX Raising Fees & APR
Posted by RichSlick under Watch Out
[6] Comments
I just got a note from American Express stating they are raising their late fee to $39 for balances over $250 and a mere $19 for balances under $250. The APR on my account is going up to 15.25% which is a significant bump up from 10.99% I had a while ago. It’s good to see legislation to protect consumers in action!
This won’t impact me as I have a system of sending in payments to weekly to credit card companies to avoid these ripoffs. I encourage you to do the same.
6 Responses to “ AMEX Raising Fees & APR ”
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September 10th, 2009 at 8:04 am[...] Secondly, I know many people that have stopped using credit cards altogether because of the high interest rates. Many people have been rate jacked, including 700+ FICO consumers of which I recently posted and received a few comments on here. [...]
August 11th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
They did the same thing to me this week. I have been with them since 2005 and have always paid on time and have put all sorts of business charges on my card (always paid off within the grace period though). I too had 10.99(fixed) and they raised me to the same 15.25 VARIABLE! My wife has a Mastercard through her bank that has given us a 10.5% fixed for years and a similar points program (also for free). I called AMEX and asked them to lower my rate again because I would be stupid to pay 15.25 variable when I can pay 10.5 fixed. Now, I didn’t actually PAY any interest because of my payoff within the grace period but it was the slap in the face to me the loyal customer that upset me. They kept telling me about the credit crunch and they had no choice but to raise it. I told them that I understood and I also have the choice to cancel and use the other card. They just kept telling me that they were sorry and they could not lower the rate. I even told them that they could raise the rate because I understood the the financial situation for many credit companies (but not to 15.25) and they still would do nothing. Now, I understand that the rep had his hands tied and was doing what corporate told him to do but they just lost a customer that made money for them and what really upsets me is I have no clue what goes through these CEO’s minds when they axe customers that are making them money. Sure, it’s their right (via the contract I signed) to do this but it’s also their burden when they lose my MONEY MAKING business. I guess I will never understand the credit card world.
August 11th, 2009 at 5:49 pm
Sounds like my experience, Mr. X. I was a consumer and not a business account, but I was loyal since 2002 and always paid on time and never went over my limit…whenever I had a choice of which card to use I ALWAYS used my Amex…but he just kept blaming it on the banks for raising their own rates, so I finally told him to cancel the account. I don’t get it…are they going to tell their shareholders they pushed away their most loyal customers by punishing them when they should have been rewarding them, and then just say it was the banks’ fault?
August 11th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
Well ALL my accounts are doing something like that but I’m surprised by AMEX doing it. They must be in really bad trouble to resort to this nonsense. Oddly enough my FICO has never dropped below 720 so I FICO truly is irrelevant.
August 11th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
No doubt that AMEX has some financial issues. It amazes me though that using this business strategy to help fix their financial issues even made it out of the board room. Did AMEX actually think that I would sit back and just accept a 4.5% rate increase that is ALSO converted to variable. All while the competition is offering better rates and the same quality service. The guy on the phone even mentioned that everybody is raising rates but I mentioned to him that at this point in time I have access to a card with a 10.5% fixed rate (has been for several years) that is accepted at more vendors (a couple of stores I shop at do not accept AMEX). I will worry about the other companies raising their rates later but YOU (AMEX) are raising my rates now. I guess that AMEX thinks that I am a hardcore loyal customer that would NEVER leave the machine. Well, I left the AMEX machine and now I’m part of the Master Card machine:)
August 15th, 2009 at 2:05 am
It almost make sense when you consider that someone who pays off their bills each month and thus never pays interest, or late fees, or overlimit fees, etc. just doesn’t make them much money. IIRC, something like 75% of the credit card industry’s revenue comes from the “poor behavior” customers. But certainly there is more risk for writing things off with these people too.
Seems they’re as addicted to this as the mortgage industry was to Alt-A loans and such. Only difference is that they seem to realize it and are trying to turn everyone into that type of customer by changes in terms until they catch you in a slip-up.
I’m running out of credit card companies willing to stick with the fixed rate plan now that the governing law only allows them to easily change things with the variable rates plans.