The San Francisco Chronicle noted that credit card companies are sometimes taking the collection of credit card debt that is in arrears into their own hands.  No longer waiting for consumers to bring the account up to date on their own because of the threat of a damaged credit report or litigation, the credit card [...]

The Epoch Times has an article about the new credit card reform proposals - but it is the couple credit card statistics in the article that are very interesting to me.

Credit card companies spent $1.2 billion in the first three quarters of 2007 on advertising alone.

Credit card companies took in $18 billion in penalty fees [...]

Business Week has put together a video with the basics about the credit card industry practices, why the credit crisis has escalated the problem of increasing interest rates, and a brief discussion of the credit card reforms in Congress. Here is the video:

The San Diego Union-Tribune has a list of a few other measures under consideration by Congress in its deliberations over credit card reform.
The measures include:

Restrictions on marketing to college students and those under 21 years of age.
7 percent limit on penalty interest rate increases.
Ban on fees for paying by phone or when using the internet.

Proposals [...]

Credit card debt increased by 5% in February and 7.9% in March, according to Marketwatch.
But that’s not rosy for credit card companies.  Payments on 4.11 percent of credit cards at the largest six U.S. credit card companies are more than 30 days late, according to Bloomberg.  That’s the highest average since November of 2004.