Keeping the chatter alive...

I’m about to head out of the country and decided it would be wise to contact my credit card company and let them know where I’m going – you know, so they don’t think my card has been stolen and cancel it mid-trip (Note: they recently cancelled my card because they thought it had been stolen after I bought gas from the gas station I always go to and something from Wendy’s…). Now, I’ve had this card since 1996 and have only really started to be annoyed with them in last six months. And my annoyance is primarily centered on the fact that, due to the recession *ahem* troubled economy and the fact that said credit card company has lost a fortune, the company representatives seem bound and determined to milk as much money out of me as possible. This comes in a lot of forms, from jacking up my APR because I pay my bills on time to constantly trying to sell me something. The most recent example? After I gave the representative my travel itinerary, he said that, since we were speaking of traveling, would I be interested in some checks that could be used to transfer funds from other credit cards to this one. Um, how is this at all related to my upcoming travel? Gotta love the fact that the representatives have to work that question in to every conversation...