It seems that President Barack Obama's all out support for the credit card legislation may finally yield results come Tuesday. According to Sen. Harry Reid, Senate Majority Leader, the U.S, senators have decided that Tuesday evening will be when they will hold a vote on whether the credit card bill will get senate approval or not.
The credit card legislation under deliberation in the Senate aims to stop controversial credit industry practices. It will also make it much more difficult for credit card companies to issue rate hikes on credit cardholders. The credit card legislation would also greatly limit credit card marketing practices for persons under 21 years of age.
The Senate's credit card legislation bears many similarities to the Credt Cardholders' Bill of Rights, which the House passed last April. However, it is much more stringent than the House's bills in several areas. The Senate's credit card bill will also take effect much sooner. Once enacted, it will come into effect nine months after. On the other hand, the House's legislation would only become law a year after it is enacted or on July 1, 2010.
The issue of credit card regulation gained political prominence when households, already heavily burdened with financial problems, cried out against banks who were introducing sudden interest rate hikes and hidden fees, even as they received large financial bailouts from the government.
As a result of the public outcry, President Obama has made the issue a priority and has been calling for support from all sectors. His most recent campaign being his town hall meetings, one of which was recently held in New Mexico. He has also put a lot of pressure on Congress, demanding that they bring the bill to his table when Memorial Day comes.
The banking industry is understandably not very keen about the bill. They have warned that the new regulations being implemented by the bill might lead to a dry up of credit for a number of borrowers. It might also increase all borrowers' introductory rates.
Whatever the banking industry may have to say on the matter, the legislation still continues to gather steam in the Senate. Sen. Reid recently released a statement saying that the senators had come to an agreement to proceed to a procedural motion vote to proceed to the bill. If the motion is passed, which is highly expected, all pending amendments that remain will be considered by the Senate; after which, they will continue to vote on the legislations' final passage.