Credit card issuers must revamp monthly statements by 2010

Federal regulators have asked credit card issuers to make monthly statements sent to millions of credit card users easier to understand. The deadline for the changes to take effect is July 1, 2010, although some issuers may roll out revamped statements sooner.

The changes that clarify statements are part of a much larger series of credit card regulation reforms passed by federal banking agencies in December 2008.

In consumer testing of credit card statements, users complained that wording was confusing, the type too small and key information missing from existing monthly statements. Testers said they liked information presented in boxes that they could clearly read.

The previous standard for credit card disclosure was the so-called Schumer box, which required key terms to be listed in a table and included in credit card offers, applications and monthly statements. The new standard is like the Schumer box on steroids, with much more details about terms and what they mean.