Love to Know (LTK): There is a lot of information out there. What do consumers need to know about these laws?

Beverly Blair Harzog (BH): When it comes to credit, there are many laws in place to protect consumers. Consumers need to know what rights are protected by these laws. If consumers know the laws, they’ll know when they’re being treated unfairly and when their rights have been violated.

Protection Under the Laws

LTK: How do the collection laws protect consumers?

BH: The laws are designed to ensure that consumers are protected from illegal or abusive tactics by collectors. The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act protects consumers from abusive collection practices. For instance, collectors can only call you between the hours of 8 a.m. and 9 p.m. and they cannot threaten you or use abusive language. Collectors are also prohibited from calling you at work if you’ve told them not to call you there.

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The Internet has made applying for a credit card quick and easy. Not only has the Internet made online applications a reality, but it also has made finding, reviewing and comparing credit card offers a snap.

While it may at first seem complicated to apply online for a card, it’s really simple. We’ll walk you through the process here, which only takes a couple of minutes. An online credit card application involves just three steps:

1. Compare, review and pick the card you want
2. Visit the card’s secure online application page
3. Fill out the online form to submit your application

Let’s take a look at each of these steps.

Step 1: Compare, review and pick the card you want

The first step is to choose a credit card. We’ve made that task easier by organizing credit card offers by category. In the left sidebar you’ll see five primary categories of credit cards: (1) low interest rate cards, (2) rewards cards, (3) cards by credit history, (4) cards by type, and (5) cards by issuer.

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FICO stands for Fair Isaac Corporation, which invented the most commonly used credit score in use today. The three major credit bureaus, Equifax, Experian and TransUnion, each maintain their own sets of scores using slightly different criteria, based on the type of data that the companies keep on file.

The scores help prospective lenders and credit card issuers assess the risk of offering accounts to different applicants. The scores are also used as a basis for adjusting interest rates on existing accounts.

Use FICO Credit Score Estimators

These calculators provide estimates, not real scores, so don’t assume your score is exactly the same as what is estimated. The more accurate the information you input into these tools, the more accurate the estimate you’ll receive. Many people supply more optimistic information about their borrowing histories than what the actual data held by the credit bureaus reflect.

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Week One of Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University focuses on one of the most important things you can do to improve your financial health – saving. Saving is important because it forces you to spend less than you earn and change your financial habits in a positive way. Saving also gives you resources to fall back on, changing what would normally be a financial emergency to a financial inconvenience.

Super Saving: Common Sense for Your Dollars and Cents

How and why you should save

The how is a simple concept, even if it isn’t always easy to implement. Making saving a priority and pay yourself first. One way to do that is to set up an automatic withdrawal from your paycheck so it goes straight into your savings account. Dave lists three main reasons for saving: 1) to use as an emergency fund, 2) for making purchases, and 3) for wealth building.

1. Save for a rainy day, because it’s going to rain

One of the focal points of the Super Saving segment was the emergency fund.

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Henk Vermeulen of FNB who is their fraud specialist for credit card fraud said cards can be skimmed in three ways. The first is when the card is taken out of the consumer’s sight for transactions the card is skimmed then. The second is when con men place a device on the ATM machine to copy the card during while it is being used or the third being distracting them and getting their PIN. “When these statistics are taken into consideration, consumers have to be empowered with the knowledge to recognize fraudulent activities,” FNB said.

FNB said after March 2007, the estimated fraud was Rs8.5 million when compared with the March 2008 figure of Rs15.63 million. This large increase in fraud has caused companies come down hard on regulations.

“Fraudsters can also place micro cameras and PIN-pad overlays at ATMs to obtain the consumer’s PIN,” Vermeulen said.

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