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How To Reduce Your Credit Card Interest Rate
By JLP | January 9, 2007
Today’s Wall Street Journal offers up some advice on lowering your credit card interest rate ($). Here’s the general idea:
1. Competition is driving credit card companies to lower their rates or risk losing customers.
2. Customers who have good credit records and are considered good customers are in the best bargaining position.
3. All they (customers) have to do is call up their credit card company and ask for a lower rate. The worst they can say is “no.”
The article does suggest you look at your credit report BEFORE you call your credit card company because you don’t want to find out about any surprises while your on the phone with the company. They also suggest that you BE NICE!
Finally, the article even offers the following script to help you in making the call:
“Hi, my name is ______________. I am a good customer, but I have received several offers in the mail from other credit-card companies with lower APRs. I want a lower rate on my card, or I will cancel my card and switch companies.”
How’s that for blunt and to the point? I can just imagine credit cards getting a barrage of calls from people all saying the same thing.
Topics: Credit Cards |
January 9th, 2007 at 4:23 pm
I actually do this every 6 months, and I’m due again in March. Works like a charm. Now if only they’d offer to reduce my principle…
January 9th, 2007 at 6:51 pm
I just don’t use credit cards if I can avoid it. I did negotiate a 6 month 0% on purchases that really helped in our trip to San Francisco for work. It took 2 months to finally get reimbursed, and I was able to pay down debt with actual interest rates.
January 10th, 2007 at 8:48 am
Well I agree with Alissa, its better wait for the right time. Yes you are right about getting a barrel of calls to credit card companies with same script.
January 10th, 2007 at 9:00 pm
[...] If, by chance, you’re credit card balance transfers are about to expire, you’ll want to explore getting a lower rate. [...]
January 11th, 2007 at 9:21 am
Do to many at once and you can temporarily hurt your credit score due to all the inquiries. Ask your credit card company when they do the annual review. If it is close to that time, you may want to wait, as that is a soft inquiry and does not hurt your score.
January 12th, 2007 at 10:18 am
[...] JLP at AllFinancialMatters discusses how you can call your credit cards to reduce those interest rates. [...]
January 12th, 2007 at 10:58 am
I also call our cards up every few months with great success. The most recent was getting a rate of 23% dropped to the 8% range. We’re due to make another round of calls.
February 28th, 2007 at 2:12 pm
The credit card market is very competitive. For the most part, the credit card companies will lower your rate– especially if you’ve received a better offer from another company. All you have to do is call!
May 16th, 2007 at 2:33 pm
I’ve been calling almost monthly regarding my WorldPerks Visa Signature Card to get the $90 annual fee waived. Each time, I did a spiel similar to the one above (replacing the “lower interest rate” with “1st year annual fee waived”). Some PSRs I spoke with were compeltely unresponsive (”Its a valid charge, sir”) and others were sympathetic, but said they couldn’t do anything. As my fee was due mid-June, thought I’d keep trying up-to-until I would be charged and would cancel if not waived. I was always extremely polite and nice each and every time.
Well, today, finally, I had success. PSR said they could not do anything, but asked if OK to put me on hold to get their supervisor. Of couse I said I would not mind at all and thanked them for the effort. 3 minutes later, the supervisor told me I “qualified for a good consumer credit” or something like that.
So, after a few months and maybe a total of 10 minutes of calls, I saved $90 (wanted to keep the card in that it is the one I’ve had the longest and it has a high credit limit … i.e. didn’t want to hurt my FICO score this year).
IN fact, writing this reply probably has taken longer than the entire time I have been on the phone over the past months with Worldperks Visa.
Anyway, just wanted to thank you, JLP, for the advice. It took a little time, but was worth it and it worked.