Wanted to plug this post on qvisory.com. While our largest banks are raising rates and fees on their credit card customers with one hand, and accepting hardworking Americans’ bailout money with the other, credit unions and community banks have quietly been surviving, doing business the way it’s always been done: accepting deposits and making good loans to creditworthy borrowers and keeping them on the books (as opposed to quickly selling them to investors).
Credit unions are not only surviving, but still treat their credit card customers with respect by offering cards with friendly terms. While most credit unions have remained small, and true to their mission of serving “people of small means,” a few of them have become very large and have developed less friendly products.
How do you pick the best credit card? Those offered by the largest U.S. banks all have very similar features, fees, terms, and conditions, now that consolidation in the industry means that only a handful of lenders make up the lion’s share of the market. The only way they seem to differentiate themselves is through the design of the card or through rewards programs, which are, of course, just window dressing on the true costs of using a credit card.
Instead, you might try getting a credit card from a credit union. Cards offered by credit unions generally make their terms clearer in their offers, and they’re often on much friendlier terms and conditions, says a 2005 report by the consumer group Woodstock Institute, which surveyed the 10 largest banks and 10 largest credit unions at that time. Though credit unions’ cards may be more difficult to find—you’ll have to be a member of a credit union first, and they likely aren’t sending you credit card solicitations every week like banks are—credit unions usually offer all the benefits of a bank credit card, but in a way that is more clear and friendlier.
