Would you pay $400 a year to own a credit card?

That's how much the First Premier Platinum card can easily wind up costing its customers, according to CardHub, a credit card-tracking website that has examined more than 1,000 credit card offers.

First Premier's Platinum card, aimed at consumers with poor credit, not only boasts a sky-high 36% APR but it also comes loaded with some of the highest fees in the credit card industry, said Odysseas Papadimitriou, CEO of CardHub.

First Premier, which has 2.6 million customers and sends solicitations to 1.5 million consumers each month, says it is helping consumers who would otherwise be rejected by most credit card issuers and therefore needs to price in risk by assessing high fees and interest rates.

"All of our products are priced based on the risk associated with offering the product to these individuals, many who find themselves at the lower end of the credit scale," CEO Miles Beacom told CNNMoney in an email.

While Papadimitriou agrees that fees and interest rates for high-risk customers should be steeper than they are for customers with good credit, he said the kind of fees First Premier charges are doing little to help customers who are already in a bad financial situation.

"[First Premier] is claiming to be helping people with bad credit. How are you helping them by charging these outrageous costs of your products?" he said.

The nastiest fee is the "Credit Limit Increase Fee." Customers pay the fee each time their credit limit is increased. Papadimitriou said he knows of no other card company that charges such a fee.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/first-premiers-400-credit-card-104500487.html

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