I have had two credit card accounts open with bofa for over 3 years. (My credit is good, over a 700 beacon, never late on ANY payments to anyone) I recently paid off the first one last fall. I was recently laid off from over 26 years in the Automoblie retail sales business the end of Dec 08. So I started paying the minimum payment to bofa, ($166.00 on a $10600 ballance @ 6%).
They sent a statement in February with a payment due for $369 and an interest rate of 21.99%. After calling "customer service" they explained that my last payment was $2.00 short so they reset the interest to the default rate and charged a $39.00 late fee. They refused to correct this action. Since then I recieved a letter that they were closing my account. Prior to all this happening, I tried to sign on to my account on the website to access my payment history and they had locked me out of access. With my ballance remaining the same for so long with no new charges fo many months I do not see how the minimum payment would go up at all, should be reduced as ballance is paid. I also believe they purposely send statements with the amount due in a darkly shaded area so people will make mistakes that they can take advantage of. Since all of these banks feed off each others actions against their customers I have since recieved letters canceling other accounts I have open and resetting interest rates to a higher default rate which makes it very difficult to survive just making the minimum payments. I still have never been late or under paid any of my creditors. Paying on time means nothing anymore, nor does maintaining a good credit rating.
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