Long rumored, now coming into practice: credit card annual fees for some customers who aren’t generating enough revenue for $BAC and $C:

Earlier this month Bank of America started notifying [some customers] that they will be charged a new annual fee of $29 to $99. 

“There is a big segment of their population that they will have never made money on, which is people who pay their bills on time every month,” said Ben Woolsey, Director of Consumer Research at CreditCards.com. 

Bank of America said in a statement: “At this point we’re testing the fee on a very small number of accounts and haven’t made any final decisions.” Citigroup is also trying out an annual fee with some card holders, and analysts expect more banks to follow their lead.

The “never made money on” statement isn’t quite accurate, as credit card companies charge merchants a transaction fee on every purchase, so it would be better if the statement were changed to “There is a percentage of customers where Bank of America and Citigroup have only skimmed 1% off the top of all the transactions they have made, and they prefer much higher profit margins.” But, the banks see money in your pocket, and they’d rather have it in theirs, so my guess is we better get used to using our debit cards, until fees start getting assessed on those, too.

Aside, some personal BAC haterade: a couple of months ago, Bank of America switched the signature card I’d carried for years with, inexplicably, a NFL signature card, and if you all know me, you know the last thing I want to carry is a freaking NFL logo card.  I called and screamed – after 45 mins on hold with two reps – and put on my princess hat and demanded a Hello Kitty card. They told me they’d get right on that. Another month later, I get a letter in the mail that says I can’t have a Hello Kitty card, that I need to keep the NFL card and suck it. Let me guess, the difference is probably that the card they issued me is one they’ll start assessing fees on, and the Hello Kitty Visa Signature isn’t.

I’d really like to cancel right now… if I could ever get someone who works there on the phone again. As such, I am going to send a handwritten letter to Kennay before he vacates his offices. It will contain four-color drawings, one of which will be a little drawing of me in a Diane von Furstenberg dress and Louboutins with a NFL card in my hand and an extremely sad face, but there will be other sketches as well. I’ll probably scan a copy and post it if anyone is interested.