Here is what I did:

Called 1.800.732.9194
Dial 0 for operator.

Gave them my card number and asked that they waive the fee. He said he could try to find another card with no annual fee. If you have a business, they can try to get you a new card that way.

He was able to upgrade me to a Visa Signature card with no annual fee.

Same points, 1 point per dollar spent, no spending limit, hotel upgrades... Points from old card transfer to new one :)

Tried to sell me promotion for 0.99% balance transfer or loan... I DECLINED

Tried to sell me credit protection plus, free for 30 days.. I DECLINED

If you have really good credit, then you might be able to "upgrade" your way out of the new annual fee.

yeah, it's a romantic notion. but it doesn't hurt to try.

Yet another example of why the dracanion power FICO scores can have on our lives make absolutely no sense. The CC companies can pretty much change whatever they want and you're left to deal with it (pay up in other words) or face having your FICO score lowered.

Two of my 4 accounts are unfortunately with BofA. Soppose I get ticked off by the piss poor service and now outrageous fees. Why should I have to personally suffer?

[www.damninteresting.com]

WTF? They already make money on balance interest *and* merchant fees. Even if you pay your balance off every month, they've made money on 3% of your purchases.

Hey, BoA, piss off! I'll go right to my credit union and dump your stupid POS rewards card so fast it'll make your greedy bloodsucking heads spin.

I got this notice........my card is not a rewards card........I dont pay it off each month, nor am I a "risk" (I usually pay $75 over my minimum, before due date each month).

I guess they dont like that I have been paying off my debt and not charging new stuff for the last two years or so............................

Its not a class action. They're giving you an option. If you want to use our product, you pay a fee. If you dont, close it out. Its your decision. No one is forcing you to do anything against your will.

My BofA card has a 1.25% cashback rebate, but... that's still not very good, really. I consider it danger money for having to deal with BofA.

Ditto. I'll lose a tiny bit of credit history 10 years from now, but so what?

I've read that a lot of people who have received a letter telling them they'll be charged an annual fee have called BofA and asked to be switched to a product that doesn't charge a fee.

If my card (it's a BofA AmEx Accelerated Cash Rewards one) turns out to be one of the ones they want to assess an experimental annual fee against, I'll be calling them to close it. If their little study results in people either doing nothing about the annual fee, or calling to switch cards (but still remaining BofA customers), they'll surely think the annual fee pilot has been a success.

Screw that - the card REALLY is not that good. It would take some serious, serious perks for me to consider paying an annual fee. Much better ones than the poxy 1.25% cashback offered on that card.

Ok, here's the deal. Banks exist to make money, and credit cards are a profit source. The way banks make money on credit cards is either when the customer is a transactor or a revolver. Revolvers put a balance on the card and then pay it off slowly, so the bank makes money on the interest. Transactors process a large number of transactions each month, but tend to pay off their entire balance monthly, but each transaction is accompanied by a settlement fee paid by the merchant.

If a customer has an open account that they never use, or they use their card in a manner that isn't profitable to the bank, then the bank has no reason to keep that customer's account open since it costs the bank money to maintain it even if there is no rewards program. Once the bank starts paying out rewards on top of servicing an unprofitable customer, it needs a way to offset the cost of those rewards. An annual fee is one way to do this. It wasn't all that long ago that all rewards cards had annual fees, and not long before that that all credit cards had annual fees.

Think of it this way: if you're collecting rewards and not paying interest or an annual fee, you're basically getting something for nothing. A good deal, while it lasts, but not something you're entitled to.

I have 2 cards w/ BoA. I had them with MBNA America before they were purchased by BoA. As other have said, the minute they try and charge me an annual fee to use their card, I'm gone. I have had those 2 cards for years, but I not going to pay for the privilege of using their card. I do not carry any balance on them so I'm sure I'm not much of a customer in their eyes.

As noted in a subsequent post, I charge almost everything on my BoA card. That behavior does not imply that I somehow naively (or perhaps irresponsibly) think of the card as an ATM. No. I think of it as a credit card...that offers me a wide range of purchase protection, facilitates returning items without a receipt when necessary, provides me with rewards, and reduces my liability in cases of fraud vs. a debit card.

Frankly, when the purchase price is the same for an item whether you use cash or credit, I cannot fathom why someone would use cash.

@speedwell, avatar of snark: i launched a similar campaign against Fleet Bank years ago. of course who bought out Fleet? BofA.

@winshape: i've been informed recently that it won't impact your credit score until it's off your record in 7 years, so the impact may be minimal by then as your other accounts will be older. you may want to double check this since i just heard it today for the first time.

@lmarconi: you have to realize that you are a profitable account for them. they make a fee off of everything you charge (i believe it's around 1%). in a couple years the banks will realize they lost more by chasing off that money than they gained with a $50 a year charge. personally i charge about $10000 a year and pay it off, so they're making $100 a year off of me, and they don't even have to worry about potentially writing off my debt. there was a time when banks loved low risk guarenteed returns.

So how much of a deadbeat am I?

In general, they rake 2% from retailers at a minimum...and often rake more...but let's just assume 2%.

2% of $42,000 is $840.

I get rewards. For each $6000 dollars I spend, I get about $50 in rewards...which is less than 1%, but let's round up...and assume that I get 1% in rewards.

That leaves them 1% net at a minimum from me...or approximately $420 per year for me using their card. In actuality, it is probably more like $500 to $600, but let's just assume around $400.

What do they do for me? They mail me a statement and process my electronic payment.

If they decide that they don't want to do that for $400 a year, screw them. If they notify me of a 2 cent annual fee, I will cancel. In a heartbeat. I just bought a house, don't plan on moving, and have an 803 FICO average the last time that I checked...so screw them. Seriously. Try it BoA.

Long live ING Direct.

As crappy as the practice is, it wouldn't affect anyone's credit score UNLESS they chose to cancel the card on their own.

This is a class action lawsuit waiting to happen.

I was going to to with cash back once I hit $25 but I'm not quite there, yet.

If they institute fees, it'll just get anyone who knows better to cancel, which may be what they want anyway.

(/sarcasm)

I was given an offer about 8 months ago to switch my regular card over to one with world points. I took it, figuring it couldn't hurt. How wrong I was.

It's my oldest card, unfortunately. If it does go to a fee, I'll have to think hard about closing it or figuring out a way to argue with them to not charge the fee or switch it from rewards to a non-reward card.

(Although, the card does carry a very small balance, so maybe, just maybe I won't be hit up with this annual fee crap))

It's not just the age of your oldest account that matters - the average age matters too. That makes it tricky, because closing an account now might increase the average age of your accounts, but if you were to open a new account (now or in the future) that additional older account would help reduce the impact of that new account...

In Soviet Russia, card charges you!

Just another scare tactic from a banking industry still angry that credit card legislation pasted this year. Now, they throw a few temper tantrums and make threats to harm customers with excellent credit who pay their bill of each month... like me.

I don't carry a BofA credit card. However, the moment ANY of my credit cards attempt to penalize me for paying my bill in full with a fee, the account will be closed within 24 hours. Not gonna happen.

Let this 1% leave BofA and go to competitors not charging fees and see how fast BofA backs off.

The flaw in trying to do a pilot program like this is that people are going to be pretty pissed when they find out they were chosen for some unknown reason to pay a fee that most people don't have to pay.

If I was about to undergo an operation where the mortality rate was 1%, I would be very, very nervous and reminiscing about whether I had lived a good life or not.

That's the thing that I don't get. What sense is there in trying to charge an annual fee to folks who are obviously using the credit card out of convenience, and not necessity.

When the card becomes inconvenient to use (for example, due to an annual fee) what do they think these people are going to do?

I'm not much on activism , people are generally better left to think for themselves ,but I would encourage anyone that reads this that receives one of these to cancel the card and keep it cancelled. That will do two things :

1) Force the banks to re evaluate their need for market share.

2) Deprive them of the merchant fees that you generate as a card holder/user.That really will be their lifeblood as new consumer friendlier rules take hold next year.

I hope that the good guys win this time...

Well, Christ, I can't resolve to do LESS business with BOA than I actually do. I've successfully talked about a dozen people into transferring their money out, though. Maybe I should step up the pace. BOA sure makes it easy on me with stunts like this, I must say.

@Jesse:

I may potentially have the option.

I have an NFL Extra Points Card which is now through BOA since it acquired MBNA a few years ago.

After years of responsible use and not carrying a balance, I either have the option of paying an annual fee or closing the account, which could potentially harm my credit score since this is one of my older accounts.

Clark Howard was talking about this the other day. Apparently, BoA has been sending out letters randomly to cardholders. In them, they announced annual fees ranging from $19.95 to $49.95. The speculation at the time was that they are looking to get an idea how much they can charge before customers revolt and cancel their accounts.