Credit Cards

A stream of highly charged particles from the sun is headed straight toward Earth, threatening to plunge cities around the world into darkness and bring the global economy screeching to a halt. This isn't the premise of the latest doomsday thriller. Massive solar storms have happened before - and another one is likely to occur soon, according to Mike Hapgood, a space weather scientist at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory near Oxford, England. Much of the planet's electronic equipment, as well as orbiting satellites, have been built to withstand these periodic geomagnetic storms.

Sunny Spot A Caribbean-inspired joint from chef Roy Choi, with rum cocktails, tropicalia and a reggae soundtrack. LOCATION 822 Washington Blvd., Venice, (310) 448-8884, sunnyspotvenice.com. PRICES Appetizers, $4 to $12; larger plates, $12 to $18 (and way up for special dishes); desserts, $4 to $8. DETAILS The kitchen is open 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday and Monday, 5 to 11 p.m. Tuesday and Wednesday, 5 p.m. to midnight Thursday to Saturday. Credit cards. Full bar. Valet parking.

First of three parts Tiffany Lee wanted a car. She was weary of the two-hour bus ride to her job at a UCLA Health System clinic. She hated having to ask friends to drive her 7-year-old son to his asthma treatments. But as a single mother with three children, bad credit and a $27,000-a-year salary, she couldn't find a bank or dealership willing to give her a loan. Then a friend steered her to Repossess Auto Sales in Hawthorne. Another buyer might have balked at the deal she was offered.

Dear Liz : I had credit scores over 800 with no late payments ever. Unfortunately, a medical issue required me to charge $24,500 to a credit card. That led to a bankruptcy, which was discharged in July 2011. My scores dropped to 672, and they're currently around 680. I'm paying two unsecured credit cards in full each month plus an auto loan that was reaffirmed in bankruptcy. I would like to continue rehabilitating my scores by applying for another loan. When a company requests my credit scores, does it also see my bankruptcy, and would that prevent me from getting credit?

When I heard last week that banks want to forgive up to 40% of some customers' credit card debt, my first question was, "What's the catch?" "There's no catch," answered Scott Talbott, chief lobbyist for the Financial Services Roundtable, an industry group that helped concoct the debt-relief program. "There's no hidden agenda. These are extraordinary times and the industry is aggressively working to help customers." He's half right.

General Motors Corp.'s GM Card and AT&T Corp.'s Universal Card won the top ratings in a J.D. Powers & Associates study of credit card holder satisfaction. The GM Card, offered through Household International Inc., got the highest rating among credit cards that offer rewards for frequent usage. The card, which gives users discounts on GM cars, scored a 110 rating, compared with the industry average of 105. J.D. Powers, an Agoura Hills-based marketing information firm, said the AT&T Universal Card was the highest-rated among credit cards that don't offer rewards.

More than 30 million cardholders had their credit limits reduced between April and October last year, but most of the adjustments were not made for traditional reasons: late payments or accounts going to collections. About 22 million cardholders, or 11% of consumers in the U.S., saw their credit limits lowered despite having no recent risky behavior or actions such as negative records added to their credit reports, according to Fair Isaac Corp, whose FICO score is used by most major credit reporting agencies.

Are high credit card fees pricing plastic out of the market? Some businesses are putting the kibosh on credit cards to avoid paying processing fees that run about 2% of the transaction amount. In other words, every time you buy something for $100 with plastic, it costs the merchant nearly $2 in processing fees. Multiply that by hundreds or even thousands of daily transactions, and that can add up to some serious coin. Typically, those costs are passed along to customers in the form of higher prices.

If you're renting a car over the holidays, chances are a clerk at the counter will try to sell you some pricey insurance options. Should you fork out the extra cash? Probably not, experts say. That's because there's a very good chance the auto insurance policy you already have would kick in if you had an accident while driving a rental. And sometimes the credit card you use to rent the car offers coverage too.

Dear Liz: I graduated from college last summer and was lucky enough to get full-time employment. However, I have a great deal of college debt, including private and federal loans. Are there government programs that help pay back college loan debt? Do you have any suggestions? I cringe at the thought of paying double what I owe over the life of the loan because of interest and want to get this debt under control in the next few years instead of 15. Answer: Your eagerness to pay off your student loan debt is admirable and is particularly appropriate when it comes to your private student loans.

Umamicatessen Think Umami Burger with kitchens specializing in doughnuts, coffee, booze and pork. LOCATION 852 S. Broadway, Los Angeles, (213) 413-8626, umamicatessen.com. PRICES Ham plates, $10-$40; snacks and sides, $3-$10; sandwiches, $11-$14; burgers, $10-$15; salads and soups, $4-$10; doughnuts, $4-$8. DETAILS Open daily, 11 a.m. to midnight. Credit cards accepted. Full bar.

A restaurant devoted to mole, Rocio's treats the sauce as an art form. And don't forget the cactus tortillas. LOCATION 8255 Sunland Blvd., Sun Valley, (818) 252-6415, rociosmoledelosdioses.com. PRICES Main courses, $16.99-$20.99. DETAILS Open 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Monday, Wednesday and Thursday; 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday; 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sunday. Credit cards accepted. Beer and wine. Lot parking. Takeout. Also at 6242 Maywood Ave., Bell, (323)

The Obama administration's consumer financial watchdog wants to undo a limit on some upfront fees on credit cards, prompting criticism that it could hurt borrowers with poor credit. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is backing away from restrictions on what the industry calls fee-harvester cards. Issuers of these cards make such customers pay a large fee before they can receive cards with very low credit lines. The agency indicated that its decision stemmed from a court ruling saying the fee cap appeared to be barred by "plain and unambiguous" language in the applicable law. Lobbyists and the public have until June 11 to file comments or objections before a final decision is made.

Here is a roundup of alleged cons, frauds and schemes to watch out for. Beauty queen — Prosecutors in Santa Clara County have accused a former Mrs. Pakistan World of enticing desperate homeowners to pay her tens of thousands of dollars in a loan-modification scam. The Santa Clara County district attorney's office charged Saman Hasnain and her husband, Jawad, with 17 counts of grand theft, accusing them of bilking 17 homeowners, the San Jose Mercury News reported. In the scheme, prosecutors allege, Hasnain and her husband told homeowners that for an advance fee of at least $4,500, they would negotiate with banks to reduce the homeowners' mortgages and forgive overdue payments.

The hacking of a credit card processing company last week, with more than a million people's card numbers potentially stolen by identity thieves, highlights yet again how little privacy we enjoy in the digital age. It also highlights — yet again — how hard it can be to find out details of a security breach. William LeGro of Silver Lake is typical of a lot of people who frequently shop online. He knows that he usually has to run a gantlet of hackers and scammers to get what he wants.

Information stolen from as many as 1.5 million credit card accounts is the latest in a long line of data breaches — and an alert for consumers to monitor their accounts for fraudulent purchases, industry watchdogs say. The latest major breach, reported late last week at Atlanta payments processor Global Payments Inc., resulted in no known consumer fraud as of Monday morning, Chief Executive Paul R. Garcia said in a conference call with analysts....

Information stolen from as many as 1.5 million credit card accounts is the latest in a long line of data breaches — and an alert for consumers to monitor their accounts for fraudulent purchases, industry watchdogs say. The latest major breach, reported late last week at Atlanta payments processor Global Payments Inc., resulted in no known consumer fraud as of Monday morning, Chief Executive Paul R. Garcia said in a conference call with analysts....

Four big banks are complaining to federal regulators that American Telephone & Telegraph Co. is illegally marketing a combined general credit card and phone calling card. The banks, in filings with the Federal Communications Commission, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Federal Reserve, said the phone giant is trying to act like a bank without being subject to banking laws. They added that AT&T is improperly offering discounted long-distance calling as an inducement to gain customers.