Barclaycard Significantly Cuts Benefits For Active Duty Military Cardholders

Previously Barclaycard had the most generous fee & interest waiver policies out of all the major credit card issuers for active duty military members, they offered the following:

• APR reduced to 0%
• No fees (including late fees and annual fees)

This lasted for the duration of your active duty (further date shown on your papers). Unfortunately Barclaycard has made the decision to cut these benefits and will now only offer what is required of them under the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA). These benefits are as follows:

• Interest rate on all debt incurred before deployment is capped at 6%, for the whole period of your active duty. This includes all debt incurred jointly (e.g with a spouse). This is extended for one year after service for all mortgages and trusts, credit cards are extended for a period of 180 days.
  • Monthly minimum payments must be reduced by the interest saved
• Cannot be evicted from housing due to non payment of rent during active duty. On leases up to $2,932.31 per month (adjusted annually for inflation)
• Service members who receive permanent change of station or are deployed to a new location for 90 days or more have the right to terminate their lease without penalty

This is a significant reduction in Barclaycard benefits for active duty military members. Barclaycard made the following official statement:

Barclaycard is grateful for the service and sacrifice of the men and women in our nation’s military. The benefits we will continue to offer active duty military under our SCRA policy will fully comply with the SCRA. The benefits provided under our policy will be provided relative to only those Barclaycard accounts that were in existence prior to a Barclaycard customer going into active military service, as required by the SCRA. There is no impact to accounts currently receiving SCRA benefits under our policy.

It seems that if you’re currently receiving benefits, you’ll continue to receive the same benefits previously offered until your current orders run out. You can view the benefits all of the major credit card issuers offer to active duty military members here. I’m not surprised Barclaycard made these changes, previously their offering was probably too generous (especially when it was working on cards with an annual fee of $995).

Thanks to busterjde for originally making me aware of these possible changes and the Barclaycard media team for confirming them.