Obama Credit Card Debt Relief Program - Fact From Fiction

Online, August 29, 2010 (Newswire.com) - There has been a lot of talk lately about Obama's credit card debt relief program and how consumers can take advantage of this to eliminate their credit card debt. Online advertisers and debt relief companies have capitalized on this notion of the government debt relief bailouts however this concept is kind of misleading. The government has not sponsored any credit card debt relief program for consumers. However, they have enacted several policies and bills that make credit card debt relief options more possible.

First of all, the Federal Trade Commission just enacted new laws that change the way credit card debt settlement programs work. The new laws passed on July 28th 2010 ban debt settlement companies from collecting upfront fees from consumers. This means that consumers now have much less risk when entering into such a debt relief program. If the debt settlement company is not able to successfully settle the debts, the consumer doesn't have to pay a dime.

The biggest credit card debt relief help that is provided by the government is in the form of tax breaks. Creditors of unsecured debt don't agree to debt settlements because they are nice guys. All of the debt that creditors settle is compensated for in terms of government tax breaks. These government tax breaks encourage creditors to make debt settlement deals and with the massive amount of people currently in debt many think debt settlement filings will outpace bankruptcy in 2010.

This new debt settlement legislation is considered a victory for the Obama administration as well as consumers in credit card debt. All the shady debt companies will be forced out of the market but the
legitimate debt settlement companies will survive. The legitimate companies that have been successfully settling consumer debts will have enough confidence to collect their fees on the back end.

When people here "Obama Credit Card Debt Relief Program" they assume that Obama was the one spear heading reform in the debt settlement industry. In actuality though, it was the FTC that was pushing these new regulations and they were the ones responsible for these new credit card debt settlement laws. One would infer however that President Obama would be supportive of these new laws seeing as how it is clearly safeguarding consumers in credit card debt.

Credit card companies and other creditors of unsecured debt are willing to make deals. They know that if the consumer were to declare bankruptcy they would likely not receive any of their money back. With an increasing amount of Americans on the verge of bankruptcy, credit card companies are agreeing to more debt settlement deals than ever before. They would rather have 50% of their money back than none at all.

Only consumers with at least $10k in credit card debt who are experiencing a legitimate financial hardship will be able to qualify for a credit card debt settlement program . There are also other debt relief options including credit counseling and debt consolidation. It would be wise to speak with a debt relief specialist that can go over all of these options with you in depth. This way you can fully analyze which debt relief option makes the most financial sense for your situation.

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