February 22nd… the day George Washington was born, the day Florida became a state, the day Dolly the cloned sheep was debuted to the world – and equally important – the day Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act went into full effect

If you’re a regular reader of Credit Card Forum, then you already know we have talked about this extensively over the past few months, but here’s a quick summary of the highlights:

Interest Rates
From this day forward it will be much more difficult for credit card companies to raise interest rates on existing balances. This includes promotional interest rates.

Payments
Now your payments will be applied towards the balances with higher APRs first. Grace periods must be at least 21 days. Due dates can no longer fall on days the mail is not delivered

College Credit Cards
The days of free pizzas and T-shirts for college students that fill out a credit card application are over. If they’re under the age of 21, they either need to have a co-signer or a verifiable job to pay the bill themselves.

To find out all the details, you can use the search function on the right side of this page to see our previous posts.

Rep. Carolyn Maloney first introduced her bill for reform three years ago. Here’s a recent interview where she discussed how shocking it is that they were able to pass the reform without loopholes…