With the majority of credit card companies raising their rates for card holder’s, you could very well find yourself paying more interest on your card balances than you had originally planned on. The good news is you don’t have to take a higher interest rate as the answer!

In fact, as long as you have decent credit, there is no reason why you should accept an interest rate hike from your credit card company. With the economy the way it is, credit cardholders have been reporting that even though they’ve never made a late payment on their cards their interest rates have been increased or their credit limits lowered. If you receive a notice that your rate has been increased, you should take a moment to call them up and request a lower interest rate. If they say there is nothing they can do, you can thank them for their time and let them know you will be transferring the balance to another credit card with a lower rate.

Chances are, they may come up with something they can do for you once they hear those words! If so, you can decide whether the lower rate is satisfactory to you, or if you want to shop around for lower rates.

When looking for credit cards to transfer your higher interest balances to, you want to keep in mind a few things to ensure you get the best deal, including:

• Make sure the new credit card has a lower annual fee than the one you are looking to replace (preferably pick a credit card without an annual fee)
• Read the terms of the balance transfer offer carefully: how long is the interest rate good for? What will the balance transfer rate change to once that preliminary period is over?
• Find out whether there are balance transfer fees, and how much they are. Sometimes, a card will offer a low interest rate on all balances transferred, but then turn around and charge you 1-3% as a balance transfer fee. You’ll have to play around with the numbers to see if you’re really going to save money over the life of the balance after paying the fee to transfer it.

The best balance transfer offers give you a low fixed interest rate for the life of the transferred balance. That means the rate doesn’t change for however long it takes you to pay off that balance, provided you make your payments on time. If you can’t qualify for that type of balance transfer offer, you should look for offers that give you 0% interest for 12 months, and focus on getting that old debt paid off within that year. If you are able to increase your payments enough to pay off the balance within the 12 month introductory period, you’ll pay back just what you owe and nothing in interest!

At the very least, you could consider balance transfer offers of 6 months interest-free; and if you still have a balance at the end of that term, see about moving the balance to a new credit card with a 0% balance transfer offer; or requesting a better rate from your existing credit card company.

Playing the Credit Card Balance Transfer Game was created by and is property of American Consumer News.