Banking & Credit Cards
How banks, credit cards, and payment systems work. Covers products, rates, fees, regulations, and what consumers need to know to navigate the banking system.
Latest in Banking & Credit Cards
Congress killed the $5 overdraft cap, and $225 in yearly savings vanished
Households that regularly overdraw their bank accounts lost a projected $225 in annual savings on May 9, 2025, when the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s overdraft...
Your bank deposits are insured up to $250,000 per depositor, and spreading money across banks covers more
Anyone with more than $250,000 in a single bank account faces a real risk if that institution fails: the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation will cover...
Georgia banks can now freeze suspicious transfers to protect older customers from scammers
Georgia’s older and disabled bank customers gained a new layer of protection after Governor Brian P. Kemp signed HB 945 into law. The measure, enrolled...
$253 billion is what Americans paid in credit-card interest and fees last year, a record
American households carrying credit-card balances absorbed a record $253 billion in interest charges and fees last year, a sum that exceeded every prior annual total...
A courier who posed as an FBI agent to collect cash from elderly Florida scam victims got 27 months
A federal court in Gainesville, Florida, sentenced Xin Liu, a 40-year-old Chinese national living in Apopka, to 27 months in federal prison for her role...
The Grad PLUS loan program ends July 1, capping what graduate and parent borrowers can get
Graduate students and parents who rely on federal loans to cover tuition face a hard borrowing ceiling starting July 1, 2026, when the Grad PLUS...
Federal student-loan defaults could hit a record 13 million by the end of 2026, up from 8.8 million now
Roughly nine million borrowers now hold $220 billion in defaulted federal student loans, a figure that climbed by about 1.3 million borrowers in the most...
A bill to cap credit-card interest at 10% has stalled while the average card charges over 21%
Two companion bills that would slash credit-card interest rates by more than half have gone nowhere in Congress, even as the average rate charged by...
$5,500 is what Pawn America data-breach victims can claim for losses, by July 13
People affected by the 2021 Pawn America data breach have until July 13 to file claims for up to $5,500 in documented losses. The breach...
A new credit card now averages a 23.79% APR, near a record high
Americans opening new credit cards are staring down an average annual percentage rate of 23.79%, a figure that sits just below the highest levels ever...
36,000 borrowers cheated by their colleges are getting their federal student loans erased
Tens of thousands of former students who were misled by their colleges are having their federal student loan balances wiped clean. The U.S. Department of...
A scammer who collected elderly victims’ cash and gold by courier just got 18 years in prison
A 23-year-old courier who helped strip elderly Americans of their savings has been ordered to spend 18 years in federal prison. Atharva Shailesh Sathawane, of...
A Florida widow, 79, lost $200,000 to a crypto scam, then helped police trap the courier sent back for $30,000 more
A 79-year-old Florida widow who had already lost $200,000 to a cryptocurrency scam agreed to cooperate with law enforcement when the same fraud network sent...
Cardholders and merchants have until July 15 to claim a share of American Express’s $250 million card-fee deal
Cardholders who paid fees on non-rewards American Express credit cards or debit cards in certain states now face a July 15 deadline to file claims...
$250 million from American Express will be split with cardholders and merchants over card-fee claims, with claims due July 15
Merchants and cardholders who paid fees on American Express transactions now face a July 15 deadline to file claims in a $250 million class action...
Who can still get a check from Capital One’s $425 million settlement? Anyone who held a 360 Savings account from 2019 to 2025.
Millions of Capital One customers who watched their savings account interest rates stagnate while the bank promoted higher yields on a nearly identical product now...
$3 million in FTC refunds is going out to homeowners deceived by the Home Matters mortgage-relief scheme.
The Federal Trade Commission is sending checks to 1,821 homeowners who paid illegal upfront fees to a mortgage-relief operation that falsely promised lower payments and...
New Parent PLUS borrowers lose access to Public Service Loan Forgiveness on July 1.
Parents who borrow federal loans to help cover their children’s college costs after July 1, 2026, will no longer qualify for Public Service Loan Forgiveness....
The SAVE student-loan plan is ending, and 7 million borrowers have 90 days to pick a new plan or be moved automatically.
Roughly 7.5 million federal student-loan borrowers enrolled in the SAVE repayment plan will soon receive notices from their loan servicers telling them the plan is...
Freeze a grandchild’s credit to block identity thieves from opening accounts for years.
Children who have never applied for a loan or a credit card can still become victims of identity theft, and the fraud often goes undetected...