Hi folks, Tell me what you think of this: About three years ago I found myself in a financial disaster and basically $%%$#@! up my credit. During this time I had an Amex OPtima card with a $6000 CL. I had this card maxed out (but never payed late). Apparently good old AMEX pulled my report and saw the mess I was in, so naturally they DROPPED my credit line to $1000. Of course this in turn made me like $5000 over the limit and demanded a hansome over limit fee ($29) per month to this very day. What would all of you do in this situation? The account is R1 - perfect but I'm being killed with these damn late fees - is this legal????????? Thanks, Sal
Sal, It doesn't sound legal to me. You might want to call your states attorney general's consumer affairs dept. and/or the FTC to get their opinion on this. Dropping your credit line to below the balance owed and then charging overlimit fees as a RESULT OF THEIR OWN ACTIONS must be illegal. What contact have you had with AMEX about this? Have you called or written? Do you have any paper trail? I think they have to give you notice 2wks before changing the terms of your agreement. Did they do that? Mist
Seems legal to me. The cardmember agreement says they reserve the right to require full payment at any time. If they can require full payment, they can obviously require partial payment. That's what they did. They'll eventually write off the debt, in which case you'd probably be able to get off their black list even if you only pay the original amount of the debt, i.e. without fees or interest. Saar
DOESN'T SOUND RIGHT TO ME...they could have just "RECINDED" your charge privelages...(took the card back)...or "JACKED" the interest rate to like 22% +/-...BUT NOT DECREASE THE CREDIT LIMIT...I THINK THAT IS ONLY ALLOWED BY CUSTOMER REQUEST!!!
