Credit Card Now

The Sony PlayStation story keeps evolving.

In the three days since the company revealed that credit card data could be among the information hacked from its database of 77 million online gamers, there have been three new developments and items of interest:

News organizations that have sniffed around in hacker boards and chatrooms are reporting that lowlifes therein are offering credit card information they say they purloined from the PlayStation database. According to the (UK) Guardian’s technology blog, hackers claim they have 2.2 million Sony customers’ credit card numbers — including their security codes, which make it easy to use cards fraudulently.

If so, that would be Sony’s — and the consumers’ — worst nightmare. The newspaper stresses that these are unconfirmed reports, but adds that some PlayStation customers are reporting that they’ve seen unauthorized charges on their cards. Th

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Tags: Card, Credit Card, Sony Playstation

Let’s face it, the credit industry is complex and confusing. Hundreds of credit cards offer different ratios for miles, points, percentages of cash back, and other rewards. And now that we’ve gone through a roller coaster of a recession, getting approved for these cards may seem impossible for many of us.

I work daily with clients who want and need the use of a credit card. As many of their financial situations have been pummeled, rebuilding credit is the first step they must take. One of the most common misconceptions about credit that I encounter centers around three words: prepaid credit cards.

What Are Prepaid Credit Cards? The name implies similar use and benefits of any credit card, the only distinction being that you “prepaid” the balance. While t

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Tags: Cards, Prepaid Cards

Accountancy, is a one of the most crucial disciplines of a business organization. Though the departments of accountancy, do not contribute directly to production and profit (well in most of the industries), they provide the entire industry with an invaluable service, that is, providing the company/firm with knowledge and information about the monetary worth of its activities. The past 100 years has seen wide spread development of branches of accountancy. Initially it was just financial accountancy or book keeping for several centuries. In recent past, concepts such as cost accounting, managerial accounting and analytical accountancy have come into being and have gained wide spread acceptance. Modern accounting which is analytical and managerial in nature, aims at making a certain analysis and conclusion about the facts and figures of accountancy. Read more…

American Express has posted a 33% hike in its record profits for its first quarter. It states that consumer spending had surged and AmEx has also managed to cut down on the funds it set aside to pay off bad loans.

The Net income posted was $1.18 billion or 97 cents per share when compared to $885 million or 73 cents per share last year stated the New-York-based lender in a statement yesterday. When 20 analysts surveyed, the average estimate by Bloomberg was 92 cents.

Chairman and CEO Kenneth I. Chenault, was quoted as saying that these record earnings during this quarter only reflected the quality of credit as well as the billed business trends which are amongst the best that has been seen recently.

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Tags: Profits, Record Profits

On February 25th I wrote this article summarizing the IRS’ new tax lien policy and what it meant to consumers who wanted to get Federal tax liens removed from their credit reports.  The IRS’ announcement, which can be seen here, doesn’t specify whether or not their new rules regarding withdrawals are retroactive.

Today we may have been given a clue as to their willingness to withdraw tax liens that predate their new tax lien policy announced February 24, 2011.  I spoke with a gentleman from Texas who didn’t want to be identified.  I’ll call him Paul for this piece.

Paul had a Federal tax lien filed against him in January 2008.  The amount was $10,600.  He paid the lien in full in June of 2008 and the lien was subsequently released.  On his credit reports the lien showed as being released.  Federal tax liens remain on your credit files for 7 years from the date released so Paul thought he was going to have to live with it on his credit file until June 2015.

He read my above referenced article, decided to roll the dice, and contacted the IRS.  Using form 12277 (Application for Withdrawal of Filed Form 668(y), Notice of Federal Tax Lien) he requested that the lien be withdrawn.  To his surprise two weeks later he received, in the mail, form 10916 (c) (Withdrawal of Filed Notice of Federal Tax Lien).  Paul sent the form to Experian and TransUnion today.  They are the only two credit bureaus currently reporting the lien.

The IRS’ policy of withdrawal seems to be retroactive.  We don’t know if the age of the lien played a part in their decision to withdraw it.  We don’t know if the relatively small amount played a part either.  What we do know is if the IRS policy is truly retroactive there are going to be a lot of people getting them removed from their credit reports well in advance of the 7 year credit reporting statute of limitations.

John Ulzheimer is the President of Consumer Education at SmartCredit, the credit blogger for Mint, and a Contributor for the National Foundation for Credit Counseling.  He is an expert on credit reporting, credit scoring and identity theft. Formerly of FICO, Equifax and

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Tags: Federal Tax, Federal Tax Lien, Policy, Tax Lien