Will Congress act on a predatory credit card industry?

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Consumeraffairs writes that congress may take a look at the credit card industry and how it's been hurting consumers for years. They talk about the practice of assessing fees for anything and everything, but don't forget about those difficult to understand agreements:

"Anyone who has ever tried to read a credit card agreement knows that the terms are simply incomprehensible," Warren said. "The inserts sent along with monthly bills to amend the card agreements are filled with language even a lawyer would have difficulty parsing."

It's as this point that some would say "well, if you don't understand it, then don't sign it". That's great in theory, but how many things in life actually work that way? Do you completely understand all the terms and conditions when you bought your car? Bought your house? Signed up for your last web service? People have a right to simple to understand terms and conditions for everything they do. Not everyone is a lawyer and even they don't want to read pages and pages of crap just to open an account with a retailer.

Most of all, the expert witnesses emphasized the willingness of banks to lend to just about anyone as a prime reason for the explosion in consumer credit card debt.

"To make the assumption of debt more attractive to these households -- and to entice them into carrying debt for longer periods -- creditors lowered minimum payment balances from around five percent of principal to just over two percent," Manning said.

Listen folks, have a little patience. If you’re going to get a refund, that’s great, but don’t under any circumstances give part of it away to a tax preparer. It’s just throwing away money.

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From the FTC website:

Notice for public comment: The Federal Identity Theft Task Force, chaired by Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales and co-chaired by Federal Trade Commission Chairman Deborah Platt Majoras, is seeking public comment on ways to improve the effectiveness and efficiency of federal government efforts to reduce identity theft.

What could I tell them about? Hmm… Let's see… Oh! How about how easy it would be to reduce ID Theft with a good Credit Security Freeze law? How about how we desperately need strong, swift protection against data mining and sharing companies?

It's fairly simple really. First we need better control of our data and second, we need to limit what can be done with the data once it's been breached.

The e-mail address to write to is hidden in a document, so here it is "Taskforcecomments AT idtheft.gov" (@ replaced to prevent bot Spam). Be sure the subject is "Identity Theft Task Force" and that you include contact information. They prefer that the substance of your comments be in WordPerfect, MS Word or PDF format as an attachment.

100 years late. Better late than never?

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In the CAGW newsletter, they report that:

In a widely-heralded and very long-sought victory for CAGW and all taxpayers, the Treasury Department announced last May that it would stop collecting the excise tax on long distance telephone service. Known as the Spanish-American War Tax, this "temporary" tax on phone service, considered a luxury at the time, has survived for 108 years, far surpassing its raison d’etre, which lasted just four months. You can apply for a refund of the payment of that tax from 2003-2006 when you file your 2006 tax return next year.

Be sure to ask your accountant about this credit.

Wireless credit cards aren't ready. Avoid them.

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From the CASPAIN newsletter:

A member of the Senate Banking Committee denounced RFID "no-swipe" credit cards at a press conference Sunday. Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) said contracts for the cards should have warning boxes disclosing "the known weaknesses of the technology." He cautioned cardholders about their vulnerability to identity thieves, commenting you "may as well put your credit card information on a big sign on your back."

RFID is an extremely dangerous technology if left unregulated and businesses are rushing to get it to the market before people know what's happening. That's why situations like this happen:

CASPIAN demanded a recall of RFID credit cards last month after the New York Times reported that a team of security researchers found that virtually every one of the "no-swipe" credit cards it tested was vulnerable to unauthorized charges and put consumers at risk for identity theft.

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Reuters reports that the recent Microsoft Zune player (the competition portable MP3 player to the iPod) has a built in royalty fee that goes straight to Universal (one of the worlds largest music companies).

Slashdot's coverage quotes Universal Music's Doug Morris as saying the following:

These devices are just repositories for stolen music, and they all know it. So it's time to get paid for it.

Yeesh.