Credit providers ‘aiming to catch out consumers’

David Kuo, head of personal finance at fool.co.uk, claims many people could find themselves deeper in credit card debt as a result of “sneaky” practices employed by certain providers.

“I think credit card companies are just trying to find sneaky ways of catching cardholders unawares,” Mr Kuo remarked.

“What they are really doing is hiding these [added charges] into the small print so that people don’t see them and they are not even aware,” he went on to suggest.

A number of observers have pointed to recent product alterations among credit providers as evidence of a concerted effort to reclaim lost revenue streams following last year’s Office of Fair Trading ruling designed to curb unfair bank charges.

Figures released recently by the money education charity Credit Action showed debt management problems lead to around 300 cases of insolvency arising each day in the UK.