A Suze Orman exclusive

We seem to be becoming a nation of reckless chargers. It drives me crazy how much money is thrown away because of sloppy card management, especially for those of you who carry a balance from month-to-month. If you aren't paying off your bill each month, you need to pay a lot more attention to your interest rate. The average is a whopping 15 percent!

Federal regulators recently put pressure on credit card companies to boost the required monthly minimum payment to 4 percent of your outstanding balance – that could more than double what you’re currently paying. As painful as it may be to have a higher required minimum, it’s actually a very good move in the long run, since it will force you to pay off the balance faster.

If your FICO credit score is above 720, push hard to get a lower rate. Call your current card issuer and tell ‘em you’re gonna move your balance to another card if they don’t reduce your interest rate. (At Yahoo’s Credit Card Center, you can shop for offers where you pay zero interest on a balance transfer for a set introductory period.) Make sure the rate you’ll be paying after the intro period is still a good deal. You’ll also need to be super-vigilant about paying all your bills on time—not just the credit card bill—when you get a balance transfer deal. Because the credit card company will be scouring your credit report to see if you trip up on any debt payments; often, according to the terms of the balance transfer, that’s all the excuse they need to immediately ratchet up your interest rate.

Another costly credit card trap to avoid is the “Two-Cycle Average Daily Balance” method some cards use to calculate your interest. I know that’s a mouthful, but it’s worth knowing about, so stick with me for a sec. If your card uses the regular old “Average Daily Balance” method, and you start your billing cycle with no balance, then you will not be charged interest on any purchases you make during that month, assuming you get the bill paid off by the due date. But the Two-Cycle method is a bit trickier, in that the card company is going to look at your outstanding average daily balance over the past two cycles, not just the most recent month, to determine your bill.

For example, let’s say that one month you had a $1,000 balance and you paid off $900 of it. The next month you didn’t use the card, so you figure you simply owe the $100 on the remaining balance, plus the interest on that $100. But your card company has a sneakier idea: It is computing your interest based on the average daily balance for the past two months.

Check the back of your most recent card statement to see what method is used, or call customer service and ask.

Whatever you do, make at least the minimum payment on time. That means the payment arrives before the due date, not that you mail the check on the due date. The fact is the credit card industry is getting fat on consumers’ tardiness, given that the average fee for a late payment is now more than $30. Screw up just three times a year and you are looking at paying close to $100 extra because you simply didn’t pay attention to the due date.