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There are already government bodies and watchdogs to regulate the finance industry. Over the past three years, the Public Broadcasting Corporation (PBS) has run a three-part special, twice, on the abuse of credit cards by cardholders and by corporate issuers. Examples have been provided as to how and why users have gotten into financial trouble by having been charged egregious fees and percentage rates. Likewise, the Sunday show, "60 Minutes", has run their own 'expose' with interviews of executives from these government watchdogs, who looked dumbfounded into the cameras and could not explain how such fees and practices could be justified - and how cardholder errors have been made.

The problem is not that card-issuing bodies ARE NOT regulated by legislation, but that no one seems to adhere to the laws because there is no financial incentive to keep it under control. Thus, these companies do what they please and it is up to YOU to bring their errors, to their attention, so that they may or may not correct them - meanwhile using your money to make profit on the interest. Those examples brought to the attention of congress were reviewed and in most cases, either corrected or eliminated in total. But what of the millions of customers who were not lucky enough to have theirs also corrected? One of the worst companies named was MBNA. Since the expose, this bank was absorbed by Bank of America. So, we bury the problem with an example and it's all okay now, right? Hardly.

Somewhere in the 1970's, there was a public outcry to have insurance policies clarified for the public to have the contracts printed in no less than 10 point type (which is standard in textbooks) so that you could read the contract without a magnifying glass. Despite such review by congress, credit card companies still print the reverse page contract language in 4 or 6 point type AND in gray ink rather than black, making it almost impossible to read without a microscope. Additionally, well-educated people - including lawyers, accountants, Ph. D.'s, let alone the public-at-large, have extreme difficulty understanding the gobbledy-gook language used to interpret just what the contract entails. After reading it, one can either accept or not accept the contract. And 'they' have the right to change it at any time, for almost any reason.

Perhaps the most egregious of all the concepts embodied in the contract is the relatively new "Universal Clause". This was a key point in each

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