So, after reading a
post at
thesimpledollar.com about mistakes he made after his financial meltdown, I decided to respond to one of his "mistakes" (Number 7, "Not asking for credit card rate reduction right off the bat) and ask how to go about doing this.
Mapgirl responded, telling me I just need to ask if there is any way for them to lower my rate. (also check out a
bankrate.com article about it) So I did it...and it worked! I called the customer service phone number on the back of the card, and at first all the phone system let me do was listen to my account balance. I hung up and tried again...I had to play dumb and not enter any of my account information, and eventually, after a bit of a delay after the "last" option, there was another option to talk to customer service. I told them I wanted a rate decrease, and they told me I was eligible, I just had to be transferred to someone else. I talked to the other person, who gave me a lower rate! While it's not great (21+% to 15.9%), it still changed, and they said that in 3 months, I can call back for another rate decrease! So that's pretty cool. Granted, I try not to carry a balance, but it gives me a piece of mind knowing that if I mess up, I'll have a lot less interest to deal with. They did mention that if I do mess up (go over my credit limit or miss a payment) my rate will skyrocket to 30+%...so I have to be careful...
In other news, I've been reading a heck of a lot more blogs than that (thanks to the magic of RSS!), and I came across
BostonGal's
post about the
Pudding Calculator. Basically, it helps you see how you're doing in your retirement funds. As of right now, my score is 69...not great, since the benchmark is 100, but I know that I'm still putting money in my Roth IRA and my 401(k), and I'll be putting more in once my student loans are paid off.
So, anyway, this I guess is me linking to other people's blogs...let me know if that bothers you, or if you like it, or whatever is on your mind!