Money Tips: Credit Card APR Lowered by Telephone Customer Service Rep

Posted On: June 1, 2006

Guest: Tigerdad101
Post subject: Credit Card APR Lowered by Telephone Customer Service Rep
Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2006 11:43 am

MindBender wrote:
Have Capital One Plat MC for a year. 0% intro rate expired last month so I called to see if the’d do something about the 19% rate - Nope.

You called? How in the world did you get to speak to an actual person? All I get is a phone tree and there appears to be no option at all to speak with a customer service representative.

On edit…

Finally got through to a customer rep by not doing anything at all when the phone tree asked me to enter my acct. number. Eventually you get an option to speak to a rep. Go figure. Anyway, went from 14.9 to 9.9 percent. Not too bad.

Guest: Tigerdad101
Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2006 12:18 pm

Wow. I wasn’t much in the mood to push it but I just got off the phone with Providian (now Wash. Mu.) after being told by the rep that they are not taking “customer initiated requests for rate reductions.” Has anyone else gotten this line of reply? I usually don’t give up that easily but I’m tired and out of sorts today. I’ll be paying off the special rate balance (1.99%) on this card in the next few weeks anyway but if they can’t come down off the 19.49% standard purchase rate (variable rate at that) I just won’t use their card in the future.

Guest: Mr. Smarts
Posted: Fri Feb 10, 2006 8:50 pm

I called my AMEX blue earlier today. They said they could go any lower than the fixed 8.99 I have now.

I usually carry a small balance of about $1500. My credit limit is 18,100. Guess that didn’t matter
_________________
Never argue with an idiot, cause they will only drag you down to their level and beat you with experience!

Guest: cabledude
Posted: Sat Feb 25, 2006 8:51 am

Discover went from 17.49 to 12.99 upon asking.

I think whether or not you have a balance is the key here. Big balance maxed, no dice, small balance or PIF always successful.

I,ve scheduled my last payment to Chase who just just jacked me to 31% APR last month. Once PIF and the new rate shows I’m going to begin asking. I’ll let you know how it goes. I think they will be willing to play ball at $0…………

Guest: Tigerdad101
Posted: Wed Mar 22, 2006 9:31 pm

I posted a few weeks ago about getting the runaround from Providian/WaMu about a reduced credit card rate. At that time they said “We don’t take customer initiated requests for reduced rates.” Since that time I paid off the balance I had with them, opened a new Chase Signature Visa account at 8.9 percent fixed and had Capital One reduce my rate to 9.9% variable. My FICO credit card score (via Providian’s site) is up to 757 after my chapter 7 finally dropped off my CRA reports and is about 70-80 points higher than when I first opened my Providian account.

When I called today I pointed out that other lenders had been reducing their rates while Providian’s rate for me had gone up nearly five points to 19.9% variable.

The rep first told me that there wasn’t much she could do but I just kept pushing (politely) that I was very unhappy with the high rate that I had and that it made no sense for me to use their card when other cards had a rate that was less than half. The rep put me on hold and came back to offer a reduction to 14.9% which would put me right back where I was before they started increasing my rate. I asked “Is that the best you can do?” and she put me on hold again before coming back and telling me that after reviewing my account, they could offer 3.99% for the next three months and 11.99% variable after that. I told her to do it.

Bottom line: Rate reduced from 19.9 variable to 11.9 variable with a 3.99 three month introductory rate. Not too bad for fifteen minutes on the phone.