the buggers!

[winterbadger]

So, I have two credit cards. One has a huge limit, the other one has a low rate. I remarked I'd love to move all the debt to the low-rate one utnil I pay it off, so the fees wouldn't be so high, but I don't have room. A friend suggested I jsut ask tehm to raise the size of the limit on the low-rate card, so I tried that. And they readily acceded, raising my limit to double what it had been on that card.

So I went to transfer the balance, and they woldn't let me. In the meantime, the two card companies had merged,a nd they won't accept transfers from one of their cards to antoher. :-( B*stards! So now I have way more credit than I need, but I'm still paying the higher rates.

AAA keeps sending me debt-consolidation offers; next time I get one I'm going to see what *their* rates are.

Comments

[didotwite]

find another, separate card that will offer you a low rate. get the balance transfer. cancel the other card. ta-da.

[winterbadger]

Well, yes, if there were another card offering me lower rates. But if I'd run across one offering lower rates, I'd have done that by now. :-)

And I don't want to sign up for another card just to use an intermediary. All this applying for cards and draft increases is playing hob with my credit rating.

[didotwite]

hob?

yeah, if you can't get a lower rate, then you're stuck, ho hum. :)

[winterbadger]

To play hob, to play the part of a mischievous spirit; to work mischief.

http://dict.die.net/to%20play%20hob/

The inimitable Michael Quinion says:

The hob part of hobgoblin was a familiar form of Robin or Robert and became a standard name for a rustic person or a clown, though Old Hob or Old Hodge were also names for the devil.

[darkhorse43.livejournal.com]

Have they sent you the checks you can write against your credit card account? If so then maybe you could write one of those to pay off the other.

[winterbadger]

Yes, but if they refuse the transaction online, I assume they'll just refuse to pay the check too. They're happy to get the extra fees if they're stealing them from another bank, but they're not really interested in giving me a lower rate if the bank that's charging me the higher rate is...themselves.

[geekchick]

Can you write the check to yourself and deposit it in your bank account? ;)

The big drawback to that plan, if I remember correctly, is that those checks get treated as cash advances and the cash advance rates on every card I've ever had have been 22% or more, even on cards with otherwise very good rates. I could be wrong about the cash advance rate though (and whether you can even write the check to yourself), as I always just shred those things when they show up.

[winterbadger]

The only ones they ever send me are specifically for use as balance transfer. I think you can use them for anything but, as you say, you get charged cash advance rates if you use them for "regular" purchases, whereas they are 0% interest for 3 or 6 months if you use them for balance transfers. Hence my desire to use them to transfer my balance (0% for three months, then a lower rate after that) and, likewise, their unwillingness to accomodate me. :-)

Plus, as luck would have it, the same company that owns (now) both my credit cards is the one I bank with.

No, I think I have to do it the hard way, and actually just pay off the principal. :-) Now, if my employer would hurry up and do their damn IPO that I bought all the stock in anticipation of, I could do just that... It would be worse if I didn't *have* the money, but having it sitting in another account, frozen until our CEO stops having cold feet, is frustrating.

[mazzie.livejournal.com]

CEOs have feet?!

[peaceful-fox.livejournal.com]

Yes, it's the heart part I'm not so sure about. ;-)

[mazzie.livejournal.com]

I bet they're not sexy and freshly manicured and downright edible, though ... arr num num


err, the feet, that is. not the hearts.

[peaceful-fox.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the biggest smile and chuckle I've had all day!

[geekchick]

I gotta say, I'm increasingly glad that I never had to deal with the possibility of an IPO. The internal market was just fine for me, thanks, and I made a nice chunk of change off of it. =)

[winterbadger]

Well, that was where this all started. Id had a very good experience with the private stock system at Sparta, so when I joined SAIC I didn't need our division manager's encouragement that internal stock meant "free money" to plunk a good cut of my pay into exerciseing all the options they gave us.

But then our new CEO decided...well, lots fo things that I think are fundamentally bad for the company, but among them that we were going to have an IPO. I understand his reasoning, which I won't go into, but I think it's a fundamentally bad idea to give control of the company's stock, and therefore a sizable portion of its value, over tot he eggheads and fortune-tellers on Wall Street. The fluctuation of stock prices on the open market often has very little to do with actual performance of the company and a lot with guesswork, image v. reality, and other events in the industry wholly unconnected to the company.

But, I figured, an IPO for a huge government services firm can't go anywhere but up, so I sunk all my spare money into exercising those options I had remaining. And I'm sure I'll be rewarded when the time comes. But until then it means a big chunk of change I'd like to use to pay off my debts is stuck waiting on the pleasure of our CEO and BoD, which is annoying.

[gr-c17.livejournal.com]

I do not have first hand info, but I've heard several folks complain about those debt-consolidation / credit counslers types.

[winterbadger]

I think it depends who does it. I'm much more likely to trust something that comes with the imprimatur of a national service organization (like AAA) than something from Pantiliupo's Debt Consolidation and Waste Removal Service.

[peaceful-fox.livejournal.com]

Pantiliupo's Debt Consolidation and Waste Removal Service.

Don't forget the Den of Iniquity division. It's their biggest selling feature.

[winterbadger]

Indeed. Lots of young men with their pockets full of smack, and lots of young women with expensive nail jobs, snapping their bubblegum and saying "Yeah, ok, but that's gonna be an extra fifty..."