Hi all!

I'm a newbie here, so please forgive me if this is posted in the wrong location or whatnot. I was just curious if anyone who has an SWA Visa has been successful with lowering their APR? I use my card quite a bit (just received CP status) and was hoping to negotiate a lower APR, but when I called a few months ago, Bank One told me that because their card was partnered with SWA, they didn't have the ability to offer lower APRs. Just wondering if anyone has been able to work with Bank One in terms of the APR, or if we're all stuck at 12%?

Take care,
Jess

Why in the world do yo want a lower APR on a mileage card? You earn NO MILES on balances you carry! And the miles (or in this case credits) you earn on purchases are completely outweighed by the interest rate payments you're making on balances you're carrying. And if you make more purchases in a month where you have a balance, you pay interest on those purchases too!!!

So you should never carry balances on an mileage earning card (unless it's through a 0% offer, perhaps, but even only in certain circumstances then). Therefore it should make no difference to you what APR it has.

Get a different card (from a different company*, and hopefully with no annual fee) with as low an APR as you can and transfer balances to it off any mileage card, and then pay off the mileage card in full by the due date each month. *The reason it has to be from a different company (than BankOne/FirstUSA) is because most low rate balance transfer offers only work on transfers from COMPETING companies' cards.

The reason BankOne doesn't allow the rate to be lowered is precisely because their accountants realize that you waste money by carrying a balance on a mileage earning card, and so they want to make sure that if you didn't do the math and thus didn't realize that carrying a balance makes no sense, you'll presumably not do the math and carry a balance no matter how high they make the interest rate! If you want to keep more of your money and give less of it to BankOne, it's your responsiblity (not theirs) to figure out how to do it. It's their responsibility (to their shareholders) to maximize THEIR profits.

Not with BankOne, but I have had luck with MBNA. Most companies will knock a point or two off of the APR if you call, especially if you have been a good customer.