Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will be?

[Aunt Spiker]

I think they should - it's common sense, yeah? You get a credit card, charge things onto it, and they tell you how much your monthly minimum . .. and interest, etc etc . . . will be.

That's called a bill, If I remember how this works.
*out on a limb, here?*
Business sense, yeah?
___________________

Well - one of our cards is in forbearance, which means it's on hold - no interest being added, no payments being expected right now.

Our forbearance will end in October. Since it's June and we have several more months I'm trying to plan ahead and alter our budget and start paying routinely on it *now* - so by October when we have to start paying on the card again officially, it won't throw us for a loop and catch us off guard or cause problems.

So I called to maybe figure this out and the credit card rep said, "Sorry, I don't have a way of finding out that information right now."
:roll:
Not even a ballpark figure. . . 50, 100 . . . nothing.

And so I asked her "how much was it before we went into forbearance, then, I'll go by that and then add on some . . . " and she said they only kept that on record for 6 months.

A credit card company who can't tell you how much they'll request in minimum and can't tell you how much you USE to pay!

I'm writing a formal request and sending it in - this is stupid - I kind of regret my husband filing for forbearance on it, now. . . finding out how much a minimum payment will be shouldn't be a trouble because they're based on a standards formula (so I thought).

 

[Gipper]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

Credit cards prey upon the stupid...no offense. Any financial planner worth half his salt will tell you the first step is to consolidate credit card debt into something of lower interest, like a mortgage. If you're not able to do that, meaning you're borderline underwater on your property and still racking up massive credit card debt, maybe you should open up your eyes and self-impose some sort of budget a 6 year old can abide by.

I tried to do this with my aunt and uncle. They both gross just over a hundred grand, but their spending is absolutely out of control. My car can go further on one gallon of gas than his truck, their oldest son's truck, and her SUV combined. They also live out in the middle of nowhere, where even a McDonalds, a Wal-Mart, or any gas station is a 10 minute drive away. In addition, they collectively go out to eat multiple times a week and don't exactly order off the dollar menu. They've mortgaged their home and family property down to the socks, and now have almost forty thousand dollars in credit card debt. Even when I tried to suggest a budget for them, they don't want to hear it. They're determined to live beyond their means.

I wouldn't mind some legislation to help this problem though, and I think Obama has either signed something into law or is about to. It's supposed to limit these predatory rates and prevent credit card companies to raise rates on individuals in methods to squeeze out more pennies just because they're of a higher risk.

Having said that, I personally hate the term "minimum payment". That's a sucker move created by the credit companies to keep people in perpetual debt while maintaining constant income. Depending on balance and interest rates, paying a minimum may pay 40 or 50 percent of principle/balance (and that's an extremely conservative estimate), down to maybe 10 percent, which is more likely. I guess I'm just lucky to never shot myself in the foot that way.

 

[Aunt Spiker]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

If I could pay on all my cards - more than the minimum - every month - I would. But I can't. So the min payment will have to suffice for 2 of my cards until I get 2 others paid off - I'm still crunching some serious numbers but it looks like I can knock 2/4 off before Christmas and then just work on the last two. . .but that depends on what the minimum payment is on this one card in question - which they won't tell me. . . I had to work it out in my own formula. . . came out to $40.00 - so I'll budget an amount over that and we're fine.

But why they couldn't just click in their numbers and tell me is beyond me :shrug: It's not like it depends on your meter usage like water or electricity.

This is the kind of mess that's cause when the person in charge of the bills doesn't PAY THEM - I haven't even gotten a straight answer out of my husband WHY this one card was in forbearance. If he was just paying on it over the last year like I thought he was it'd be 1/3 paid off by now.

 

[Harry Guerrilla]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

I think they should - it's common sense, yeah? You get a credit card, charge things onto it, and they tell you how much your monthly minimum . .. and interest, etc etc . . . will be.

That's called a bill, If I remember how this works.
*out on a limb, here?*
Business sense, yeah?
___________________

Well - one of our cards is in forbearance, which means it's on hold - no interest being added, no payments being expected right now.

Our forbearance will end in October. Since it's June and we have several more months I'm trying to plan ahead and alter our budget and start paying routinely on it *now* - so by October when we have to start paying on the card again officially, it won't throw us for a loop and catch us off guard or cause problems.

So I called to maybe figure this out and the credit card rep said, "Sorry, I don't have a way of finding out that information right now."
:roll:
Not even a ballpark figure. . . 50, 100 . . . nothing.

And so I asked her "how much was it before we went into forbearance, then, I'll go by that and then add on some . . . " and she said they only kept that on record for 6 months.

A credit card company who can't tell you how much they'll request in minimum and can't tell you how much you USE to pay!

I'm writing a formal request and sending it in - this is stupid - I kind of regret my husband filing for forbearance on it, now. . . finding out how much a minimum payment will be shouldn't be a trouble because they're based on a standards formula (so I thought).

You can get an idea of how much the minimum may be using some math.

 

[justabubba]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

I think they should - it's common sense, yeah? You get a credit card, charge things onto it, and they tell you how much your monthly minimum . .. and interest, etc etc . . . will be.

That's called a bill, If I remember how this works.
*out on a limb, here?*
Business sense, yeah?
___________________

Well - one of our cards is in forbearance, which means it's on hold - no interest being added, no payments being expected right now.

Our forbearance will end in October. Since it's June and we have several more months I'm trying to plan ahead and alter our budget and start paying routinely on it *now* - so by October when we have to start paying on the card again officially, it won't throw us for a loop and catch us off guard or cause problems.

So I called to maybe figure this out and the credit card rep said, "Sorry, I don't have a way of finding out that information right now."
:roll:
Not even a ballpark figure. . . 50, 100 . . . nothing.

And so I asked her "how much was it before we went into forbearance, then, I'll go by that and then add on some . . . " and she said they only kept that on record for 6 months.

A credit card company who can't tell you how much they'll request in minimum and can't tell you how much you USE to pay!

I'm writing a formal request and sending it in - this is stupid - I kind of regret my husband filing for forbearance on it, now. . . finding out how much a minimum payment will be shouldn't be a trouble because they're based on a standards formula (so I thought).

send a letter, priority mail, with tracking (so you can document that it was received and when)
in that letter ask for a copy of the last statement of your account previous to the authorization of forebearance
make no threats
do not explain why you want it
offer no other information

 

[Harry Guerrilla]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

Here is a bankrate calculator.
Use it as an approximate, I'd over estimate the minimum.
Just to be on the safe side.

Calculating your minimum payment

Another site:

http://www.ehow.com/how_4743205_calculate-minimum-payment-credit-card.html

 

[roughdraft274]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

I think they should - it's common sense, yeah? You get a credit card, charge things onto it, and they tell you how much your monthly minimum . .. and interest, etc etc . . . will be.

That's called a bill, If I remember how this works.
*out on a limb, here?*
Business sense, yeah?
___________________

Well - one of our cards is in forbearance, which means it's on hold - no interest being added, no payments being expected right now.

Our forbearance will end in October. Since it's June and we have several more months I'm trying to plan ahead and alter our budget and start paying routinely on it *now* - so by October when we have to start paying on the card again officially, it won't throw us for a loop and catch us off guard or cause problems.

So I called to maybe figure this out and the credit card rep said, "Sorry, I don't have a way of finding out that information right now."
:roll:
Not even a ballpark figure. . . 50, 100 . . . nothing.

And so I asked her "how much was it before we went into forbearance, then, I'll go by that and then add on some . . . " and she said they only kept that on record for 6 months.

A credit card company who can't tell you how much they'll request in minimum and can't tell you how much you USE to pay!

I'm writing a formal request and sending it in - this is stupid - I kind of regret my husband filing for forbearance on it, now. . . finding out how much a minimum payment will be shouldn't be a trouble because they're based on a standards formula (so I thought).

I'd call once or twice more. I've dealt with some service reps for my credit card company that don't give a damn and some that actually do their job. It all depends on who you get and that most likely is something they could tell you then and there over the phone.

 

[Aunt Spiker]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

Ok - I've finally crunched all my numbers.
What I've been working on for days is which approach to pay-off on our debt is best. . . there are several methods to go about it - and I've calculated out the monthly expense and debt reduction for each approach.

Traditionally they tell you to pay off the highest-interest rate cards *first* - and pay minimum on the others. . . and the monthly amount pancakes so in the end your last card has a huge amount tossed on it every month - paying it off rather quickly.

However, according to my calculations, that sounds most wise on interest $$ - but it takes longer to do that. In fact, if I did that, it would take me 'til June 2014 (on paper) to pay off all of our current CC debt. But if I pay on the cards *per* amount owed - lowest amounts first - ignoring interest rates for these cards and *when * I have only our two high interest rate cards left - *then* focusing on highest-interest first - I will pay it off (on paper) by August 2013.

So - most assuredly - I'm knocking 10 months off of our debt-reduction time and pay the lowest amounts off first.

Also - not calculating into those two charts - in exactly one year we'll be done paying on our truck and that money will absolutely go towards debt- reduction . . . in fact, if I do that - according to another chart I worked up - that frees up over $300.00 and wooosh - debt be gone - all of it - in less than a year. . . except for our mortgage. .. oh, and the sports car.

 

[Lord Tammerlain]

Re: Shouldn't a credit card company be able to tell you how much your payments will b

In your situation if it is possible


Get a personal line of credit they typically have far lower interest rates then credit cards. Use it to pay off all your credit cards and destroy all but one, perferably from the institution that provided the line of credit.


You will save in interest costs to a high level (most likely have an interest rate 50% lower then credit cards), you will have to make one or two payments instead of multiple ones depending on the number of credit cards you have, saving the headache of keeping track of the balances from so many.

Lastly with a LOC tied to your credit card if needed you can use cash advances to make the occasional payment required so as not to hurt your credit history