Students wary of new law restricting their access to credit cards

For years, credit card issuers have lavished attention on students. As potentially lucrative lifetime customers, they were courted — throughout the campus and especially near the football stadium — with T-shirts and pizzas and hats, for which many eagerly filled out credit card applications.

Those rules changed for good with the passage of credit card reform in May 2009. No longer the most coveted credit card consumers, students and all adults under 21 instead will see their access to credit restricted — no credit cards without proof of income or a co-signer — beginning in February 2010, when the new law kicks in. That makes the autumn of 2009 the last hurrah for card issuers under the old, unrestricted rules.

Big changes on campus: Students meet credit card reform
MAIN STORY: Students react to changing laws limiting credit access, marketing VIDEOS: Students react to changing laws limiting their access to credit cards QUOTED: College students sound off about restrictions limiting their credit LESSON: When is it a bad idea to ‘piggyback’ on Mom or Dad’s credit card?

See related:A comprehensive guide to the Credit CARD Act of 2009