Applying for a Fleet Credit Card?

A Credit Article Contributed by Mark Mcclelland

Fleet Credit Cards May Not Pass Muster

Fleet Boston has certainly suffered a rash of complaints over it's credit card practices recently. They've been involved in a least one class action law suite claiming that it used deceptive practices to market it's credit cards, there've been a series of complaints to Attorney's General all over the country complaining about they way Fleet posts payments, the way they handle their customers over the phone, and the way they seemingly manipulate the interest rates they charge their credit card holders and impose fees to generate revenue.

Not withstanding the recent merger of Fleet into Bank of America, whether or not any of these claims prove out to be true, it's clear that Fleet has a problem; if it's not in their business practices, then it's certainly in their public image. It remains to be seen whether BofA can clean up the problems and bad press Fleet has generated over the years.

Do You Have a Fleet Credit Card

It wouln't be surprising if you do indeed have a Fleet Boston credit card. As the nation's eighth-largest bank, with in excess of 1,200 branches in New England alone, it has millions of customers worldwide. In spite of the merger with BofA, you might want to read some of the notices posted on the web concerning the credit card practices Fleet apparently used to generate revenue over and above the interest payments it collected.

Let what you read be your guide to determine whether or not you're willing to run the risk of falling afoul of some of the same service personnel and practices as described in the web postings. You can bet that some of those same people will remain in place after the merger is complete.

And you know, there are lots of card issuers out there that apparently don't have the same kinds of issues with their customers.

Were Fleet Credit Card Offers a Scam or Not

It depends on who you talk to. There are always at least two sides to every story, and the determination of whether the offers were simply a scam to lure unsuspecting clients is something that lawyers have to fight out. But after reading some of the on line postings it's hard to believe that your wouldn't be tempted to say 'Scam? you bet; the credit card offers put forth by Fleet were obviously a scam since they actually had no intention of living up to their promises to begin with'.

But it's easy to take the other side as well by saying 'if you'd read your contract like you're supposed to, you'll see that Fleet wasn't misleading anyone; that facts are all there in black and white

It depends on who you talk to. There are always at least two sides to every story, and the determination of whether the offers were simply a scam to lure unsuspecting clients is something that lawyers have to fight out. But after reading some of the on line postings it's hard to believe that your wouldn't be tempted to say 'Scam? you bet; the credit card offers put forth by Fleet were obviously a scam since they actually had no intention of living up to their promises to begin with'. But it's easy to take the other side as well by saying 'if you'd read your contract like you're supposed to, you'll see that Fleet wasn't misleading anyone; that facts are all there in black and white.'

Well, be that as it may, and hopefully this merger with Bank of America will clean up their Fleet's act, but if you want to avoid being scammed, there are a couple of old saws that were true years ago, and remain true today:

1) if it sounds too good to be true, it is, and

2) ALWAYS read the fine print....