Chase credit cards have pulled the rug out from beneath thousands of hard working paying customers. I happen to be one of those customers. A couple of weeks ago I received a small disclosure in the mail which I normally would have pitched in the trash, but I happened to read it instead.
The disclosure was to let me know that my low interest credit card I had a fixed rate for the “life of the loan” was changing the way they do business. Me and about 850,000 plus other people received that notice. Chase has decided to raise our minimum payment from 2% to 5% which may not seem like a lot. However, most of us took this locked rate because we transferred balances so we could pay off debt. It was a way of consolidating cards.
For some people their payments are jumping from $160 per month to $400 per month and there are many others facing an even more serious problem. I believe this is similar to loan sharking practices and should be considered criminal considering the state of the economy.
Many people have opted to transfer their balance to another company and pay 3% balance transfer to be in a similar situation in another year. Others will end up being forced into bankruptcy when they would normally have continued to make their payment and pay off the debt eventually. Chase has offered some customers to keep their payment low if they can charge them higher interest. How nice of them (please note my sarcasm).
So while we all scramble to figure out what we will do to avoid this blow, Chase employees and the CEO and executives sit on top of their pile of money and laugh. I called the congressmen and emailed Obama. I received a postcard from the White House which reads “Dear Friend: Thank you for taking the time to share your views…..Your voice is shaping our country’s future, and we encourage you to join us online, share your thoughts, and build a community of connected citizens that will help address the pressing issues of our time.”
Basically I didn’t get any answers from any of the politicians. In fact, I received a call the other day from Lansing and the woman asked me in a nasty tone, “Well, what do you want ME to do?!” I suggested the government stop Chase from causing numerous loyal consumers to file bankruptcy. I told her if they couldn’t do that they should loan us all money at the interest rate Chase had promised since we were all good customers with good credit and the government would make money. She told me she had heard that from several people. Still she had no answers.
My review of Chase credit cards is that they SUCK (excuse my language) and I shall never do business with them again once I am no longer obligated to them.
I’ve seen some bloggers mention a possible class action suit against Chase. If this happens I’ll be more than happy to jump on that band wagon. I suggest that if you are considering doing business with Chase , DON’T!