Released: May 24, 2007

Fed calls for more card fee disclosure

Source: Kathy Kristof, Los Angeles Times (Free Registration)

The government wants to make it easier for you to know when your credit card company is about to pull a fast one, or to figure out when it already has.

The Federal Reserve Board announced plans Wednesday to revamp regulations so that monthly credit card bills would be easier to understand and consumers would get more advance warning when rates were being raised.

Consumer advocates called the Fed’s proposal a step in the right direction but said it didn’t go far enough.

“Telling you that you are about to be ripped off is not a consumer protection,” said Ed Mierzwinski, consumer program director at U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

“No matter what minor fixes the Fed provides to disclosure [rules], those fixes will not solve the fundamental problems in credit card marketing that allow companies to change the rules at any time and impose retroactive interest rate increases. Those practices need to be banned.”

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