Good morning everyone. I was reviewing my April Bank of America credit card statements and noticed a few changes to the Credit Card Agreement. I believe these changes go into effect immediately for all Bank of America credit cards, but check your April credit card statement to be sure. There are 3 main changes that I will cover in this post. The first is that cryptocurrency purchases will be treated as a cash advance (like money orders, travelers checks, casino gaming chips, bail bonds, etc.). I believe many other credit card companies have a similar policy regarding cryptocurrency. When you make a cash advance transaction, you do not earn any rewards, but instead start accruing interest right away. The next 2 changes involve foreign transactions and payments.
Bank of America simplified the explanation for foreign transactions. If you make any purchase in a foreign currency (instead of US Dollars), that qualifies as a foreign transaction. In addition, if you make a purchase in US Dollars that is processed outside the United States (like in Canada, United Kingdom, etc.), that is a foreign transaction. Depending on your specific Bank of America credit card, you may or may not pay a foreign transaction fee (~3% of the purchase).
Lastly, if you receive paper statements from Bank of America but make electronic payments (payments through the Bank of America website or app), you will no longer receive payment return envelopes with your credit card statement. I receive all my credit card statements electronically and save the PDFs to my computer for record keeping. In the rare cases where I receive a credit card statement in the mail, I have never paid my bill by mail (always online). I always recycle the included payment return envelope. This is probably a combination of cost savings by Bank of America and a way that they can help the environment by sending out fewer payment return envelopes. Good move!
If you have any questions about these Bank of America changes, please leave a comment below. Have a great day everyone!
I loved those payment return envelopes…were handy to do behind-the-envelope-calculations. Will miss that now!
You can still use the Bank of America envelope that contains your credit card statement for back of the envelope calculations :)
Can y’all help me and my family
What kind of help are you asking about?
Drat, another issuer not providing a return envelope. I would use their return envelopes for another letter where they didn’t include a return envelope.
Bummer, I don’t send that many letters so never considered holding onto those return payment envelopes.