ASPIRE Visa Card to Terminate Their Card Program!!!

[orky626]

Hey all, I got a letter in the mail today from my creditor ASPIRE and they were sending notice of the termination of their visa card program.  Many of you probably don't have this card, it's for people who are trying to rebuild their credit.  But I just have to ask, how will this effect my FICO score. I have had the card since 2004 and it had a limit of $750.  It's one of my oldest cards unfortunately since I have been rebuilding my credit. 

The letter states..."We must regretfully inform you that we are discontinuing your Aspire Visa program.  Consequently, we have closed your account to new transactions and may refuse to authorize any new transactions effective December 24, 2008. Further, effective immediately, your credit line is $100.

Good thing I have no balance on this card.  I called customer service because I thought they were closing my account due to inactivity since I haven't used the card since May.  However, the representative told me that due to the economic crisis, they are terminating all credit accounts and closing the program.....The credit crisis has really hit home.

How will this effect my FICO score?  I have 4 other CC and only 1 of them keeps a balance of about $500.  The limit on that card is $4,000.

[Anonymous]

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@orky626 wrote:

I called customer service because I thought they were closing my account due to inactivity since I haven't used the card since May. However, the representative told me that due to the economic crisis, they are terminating all credit accounts and closing the program.....The credit crisis has really hit home.

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I question whether any of that answer that you were given is true. The company that is actually involved with offering the Aspire credit card is CompuCredit. Last summer the FTC sued CompuCredit for deceptive practices. In deciding how to respond to the lawsuit, I'm wondering if CompuCredit decided it was easier to just cease (some of) its credit card operations. Part of the lawsuit has to do with the FTC arguing that CompuCredit was not being forthright about disclosing that it profiled customers according to where they made purchases with their credit cards.

http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2008/06/compucredit.shtm

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/06/credit-card-fir.html

http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/08_26/b4090030423218.htm

Message Edited by MojaveMoon on 12-11-2008 08:27 PM

[orky626]

MojaveMoom, I too questioned their answer. I said that I was going to call a different rep to see if I recieved a different response.  My guess is that the info you provided is really the reason...I am going to take the time to check out those links on my way to work. 

Thanks.

[JuliaTN]

My mother has an Aspire Visa and she got the same letter/answer from customer svc. Perhaps they aren't telling the truth about WHY they are discontinuing credit cards but it seems that it is true that they are being discontinued.

[joy1979]

I have an Aspire card and the same thing happenend to me. I called yesterday to at least have my APR reduced so I can pay the card sooner and the rep told me the credit program was being discontinued. I felt better about that knowing it wasn't necessarily anything I'd done wrong. Now I'm not to sure!

[jmbfl]

This is old news. The subject of credit cards issued by CompuCredit being closed has been covered in many other threads starting weeks ago. CompuCredit are bad actors. You may want to search the topics Aspire, Salute, Compucredit and Jefferson.

[orky626]

Thanks everybody for your responses.  At the end of the day, I thought it was something that I had done, to make them close my account.  I had no clue about CompuCredit and the problems they were having.  Thanks for the wisdom.  I'll have to check out the other threads also.

[llecs]

http://ficoforums.myfico.com/fico/board/message?board.id=creditnews&message.id=1926&query.id=123010#...

[Anonymous]

Hey the same thing happened to me to! What does that mean for the balance if you had one prior to the program discontinuing? I called them several times and they keep telling me I have a 0.0 balance but I'm receiving calls from an 1000000000 saying that I need to pay them. I'm really confused and don't know what to do, this company left me in the dark and I regret having a card with them. I haven't got anything in the mail on what procedures to take next. Moreover, my credit score went up 50 pts because of a 0.0 balance, this is too good to be true and I don't want this account to bite me in the long run. I know I had balance before it discontinued and talked with Aspire directly but they keep telling me its at 0.0 balance, I'd like to leave it alone and not pay anything but again its too good to be true. Who do I call? Or do I just leave it as is?

[Anonymous]

I wouldn't worry about the age.  It will keep showing as closed for whatever reason.  I had a Net 1st and it was closed by FDIC and it still shows on my age as of 4/2001.