Next Protest: Balance Transfer Day

Hot on the heels of Bank Transfer Day, in which a disgruntled Bank of America(BAC) customer encouraged people to transfer their accounts from major banks to local banks and credit unions, comes Dec. 11's Balance Transfer Day, which has credit cards in the cross hairs.

The objective of the movement is to get credit card holders to transfer their outstanding debts from high-interest credit cards to cards with zero-interest rates and zero-balance transfer fees issued by credit unions and small, community banks.

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"We are not speaking for abolishing interest rate on credit cards, we merely feel that it would be fair if they could be a little lower than today's average, [which is] around 16%, especially since we bailed out those banks with our own money in 2008," organizers say on their Facebook page.Although the similarities are undeniable, Balance Transfer Day is not associated with Bank Transfer Day or Kristen Christian, the disgruntled Bank of America customer. Nor is it affiliated with or recommending a particular bank or credit card. It's the people behind the Music For Change movement, which campaigned this summer for financial literacy with the Occupy movement, taking credit on the attempt to shed light on what they call corrupt practices and ineffective regulation in the credit card industry. The main issue that organizers want to bring to light is how banks and credit card providers lure customers with introductory zero-interest rates offers that end in six months to a year. After the promotion expires, banks "are allowed to charge any interest rate they see profitable," organizers say.As the site's manifesto says:Banks receive millions of dollars from the federal government at interest rates as low as 0%, or in some cases they do not have to repay borrowed funds at all! ... Yet we the consumers are charged costly fees and interest rates of 15% and more for borrowing money from banks. Essentially, banks are using our own tax money to make even more money off of us. So why don't we beat the banks at their own game and demand the same 0% interest rate that they receive from the federal government?

Not all customers will be eligible for balance transfers depending on their credit score or the amount of their debt, but organizers still encourage those people to take part by submitting a transfer application, which they say "will be like sending a message of protest."

Another option is to transfer a portion of your debt to credit card with a 0% APR, organizers say. Even if the impact is temporary, the hope is that there will be long-term effects in getting better terms and conditions for customers struggling in tough economic times.

Either way, expert advice suggests the organizers should make it more clear that even people who successfully transfer credit should not close their old cards, since it can lower their credit score.Just making an inquiry into a new card can hurt your score -- but probably not by much.Some 650,000 people joined credit unions in the four weeks leading up to Bank Transfer Day, says Patrick Keefe of the Credit Union National Association, and another 40,000 on the day itself, while there were only 600,000 new members in all of 2010. "So in a four-week period, we exceeded one year's growth," he says. "We really do think it was a combination of Bank Transfer Day and the [threat of the] fee itself. We heard over and over again, 'I'm not paying that damn fee.'"There were no such figures available from the Independent Community Bankers of America, although spokeswoman Aleis Stokes noted that the association's community bank locator saw a 500% increase in page views the weekend of Bank Transfer Day, or an 832% increase in page views over the 30 days before Nov. 5. She cited an informal poll of members showing 60% said they were gaining customers "who have left larger financial institutions out of frustration with their practices," but the poll was taken Oct. 17 and not refreshed in November.Keeping up the pressure on banks, there's also the New Bottom Line movement -- made up of churches, community organizations and labor unions -- who have a "Move Our Money" campaign under way. The group says it wants to take $1 billion from big banks and put them into local banks and credit unions.RELATED STORIES: >>Government Hiring Freeze Plagues Job Market>>Consumers Pay for the Loss of Debit-Card Swipe Fees>>Germany's PIIGS Role: Q&A With Gary BeckerFollow TheStreet on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook.

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