New credit card rules will help some seniors

In the most sweeping changes to credit cards indecades, federal regulators on Thursday approved new rules to crackdown on so-called unfair and deceptive practices by card issuers, suchas raising interest rates on existing debt.  The rules, issued by the Office of ThriftSupervision and expected to be approved later Thursday by the FederalReserve and the National Credit Union Administration, come at a timewhen the economy has plunged into recession, and loan delinquencies andcharge-offs are swelling as borrowers struggle to pay their bills.

The rules, which take effect in July 2010, willlet credit card companies raise interest rates only on new credit cardsand future purchases or advances, rather than on current balances.  They also restrict such lender practices asallocating all payments to balances with lower interest rates when aborrower has balances with different rates.

Source/more:  USA Today, http://www.usatoday.com/money/perfi/credit/2008-12-17-credit-cards-new-rule_N.htm

Credit card debt is a leading cause of senior bankruptcy filings, see http://www.consumerlaw.org/initiatives/seniors_initiative/credit_1.shtml