In this case, Bank of America raised Rushing’s rate because her credit score fell, she had taken on more debt and was making only her minimum payments, the president of Bank of America Card Services testified.That’s akin to a mortgage holder tripling your mortgage rate, not because you paid late or less than what you owed, but because you bought a new car on credit. Banks couldn’t do that unless you had agreed to such absurd terms in the loan papers you signed. But credit cards exist in their own world, where laws and regulations have long been crafted to benefit the issuers, not the consumers.For years, most major issuers took advantage of such laws to raise rates even for good customers, based on the way they handled other accounts — a practice known as “universal default.” But the banks took so much heat from consumer groups over this egregious practice that some banks declared universal default was dead. In reality, all that changed was the name. Now the industry talks about “risk-based” pricing, often using changes in credit scores to trigger hikes. 

Are the issuers embarrassed about this? Hardly. Discover and Bank of America acknowledged unashamedly that they raise rates based on customers’ behavior with other creditors. “Not using a cardholder’s behavior on their other debts … is like taking the batteries out of the smoke detector,” Discover President Roger Hochschild asserted in congressional testimony.

Raising rates on future purchases is understandable when risk rises, but doing so on past debt is abusive.

For years, Congress ignored consumer outrage over such practices. Now, with Democrats in control and investigating these abuses, a few issuers have made changes.

But as long as some banks defend this and other unseemly practices — such as penalty rates as high as 32% and abusive fees — Congress needs to get involved.

Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., has proposed a sensible measure that would curtail abuses: It would prohibit imposing new, higher interest rates on old balances and limit increases on a customer’s rate. If members of Congress want to show whose side they are on, they should pass this proposal by the end of the holiday shopping season.

Rushing did manage to regain her 7.9% rate, but not without a fight. She wrote to Florida’s attorney general and Levin’s Senate subcommittee. She called AAA, her card’s sponsor, and it intervened on her behalf.

There’s something wrong when consumers who pay their bills on time must go to such lengths to protect themselves.