TeachMeFinance

The Credit Cardholders’ Bill of Rights Act of 2009 (H.R.627) passed both the House and Senate and has been sent to President Obama for his signature to make it law.

When this bill takes effect early next year, among other things, this new law will:

Require advance notice of any interest rate increases;

Prohibit interest rate increases on an existing credit card balance because the cardholder misses a payment on an unrelated debt;

Prohibit interest rate increases on any existing balance unless payments for on that card are at least 60 days overdue;

Protect consumers from arbitrary fee and finance charge increases;

Prohibit interest charges on balances that have already been paid off;

Require payments to be applied first to the account with the highest interest rate;

Protect students and other young people from aggressive credit card solicitations;

Require greater disclosure of rates, terms and billing details by credit card companies; and

Establish tougher penalties for companies that violate the law.

27 million people are expected to travel by car this holiday season which is a 2.5% increase over last year.  Although gasoline prices have increased by $.30 over the last month they are still far below the four dollar a gallon price level that we saw last summer in the United States.

Troy Green, the national spokesman for AAA said that he doesn’t expect gasoline prices to return to the four dollar per gallon level.   In fact he said he’d be surprised if prices hit three dollars a gallon this summer.

Prices often go up over the holidays and during the summer.

Here are few tips to help you save money while traveling on the road this summer.

If you haven’t already switched to synthetic motor oil consider doing so.  Although it does cost a little bit more your engine will probably run more efficiently and you may use less gas.

Take a good look at your gas cap. 17% of cars on the road are said to have gas caps that are loose, damaged or missing. It’s estimated that 147 million gallons of gasoline are lost by evaporation each year.