Types of Charges

• Credit card companies can charge multiple fees at a time, and most do. The charges a company attaches to your bill depend on the card you have and how you're handling your account. Most companies, however, at least charge interest, with the exception of introductory rates. They also charge annual fees for having the card. Getting an advance against your credit limit costs you as well. Other common charges include late fees, finance charges, over-the-limit fees, and return-item or return-check fees. Some less common fees include charges for reporting to credit bureaus, investigating your account and even getting a paper version of your statement.
  
  

How to Avoid the Charges

• In some cases, a credit card company will waive some charges if you make a minimum amount in purchases every month, or if you just ask; use your company loyalty and payment history to make a case for the waiver. Charges like balance transfers are avoidable through introductory offers, but because constantly closing and opening and closing lines of credit sometimes hurts your credit score, it's better to look for the rare gems of cards that never charge for these services. Avoid late and similar fees by budgeting well, setting payment reminder notices on your phone or a software program or setting up automatic bill pay. By law, credit card companies only can charge you an over-the-limit fee if you opt-in for such charges, so when you set up your card, don't give the company the authority to assess this charge. Comparing credit card agreements lets you find a card with a minimum number of mandatory charges.
  
  

Problems and Reporting

• Sometimes credit card companies charge you improperly. This usually happens because of simple typographical errors, or because the automated billing system a company uses encounters a glitch. For example, a representative may type $200 instead of $20 in the fee field or forget a decimal point, or a software program may incorrectly compute a fee for thousands of missed payments instead of just one. The easiest way to resolve these issues is to contact a customer service representative from the credit card company. For more complex issues, such as those involving fraud or identity theft, however, you may have to report the error to the police, the Federal Trade Commission, your other creditors and lenders, the credit bureaus and your financial institutions.
  
  

Considerations

• Credit card debt is one of the biggest sources of revolving debt in America as of 2011 -- Americans have $886 billion in credit card debt based on 2010 U.S. Census Bureau data, says Hoffman, Brinker and Roberts. Sometimes people run into trouble with credit card charges simply because the number of accounts they have makes tracking expenditures and remembering account terms difficult. It may be in your best interest to find a single excellent card rather than having many cards that all offer different packages.