Wow, this is an old post, but here goes: in word, the answer is no. It literally took an act of Congress to get it passed back in the States and given my experience here in the UK, citizens would never let their government give financial institutions the power to do so. It's a hideous practice which has hurt a lot of vulnerable people. Here, folks think a 16% interest rate is high. Well, thanks to Universal Default, interest rates - on credit cards you may have never been late in paying, for example - can be increased much more than that.

Hi

I'm not aware of this in the UK since it either requires a regular sharing of credit default information directly between banks and non-banks. Credit reference agencies such as Equifax and Experian hold this type of data, however comapnies can only access this information with your permission.

One to look out for in the future perhaps...

I recently cam across an article on the US version of yahoo finance talking about "universal default clause", this basically says that if you default on any of your credit commitments (utility bills, mobile phone bill, loans, overdrafts etc.) then your credit card company can increase your interest rate. They do this by monitoring your credit file.

Apparently in the US when you sign for a credit card there is sometimes the "universal default clause" in the T&C's

Does this exist in the UK and if not, could the credit card companies introduce this?

link to the article

http://finance.yahoo.com/expert/article/millionaire/26303